On the Web
For more information about Alzheimer’s, visit
www.alz.org
Shelley Lafayette watched a kite with her husband’s name on it lift higher and higher into the air.
Next to Bob Lafayette’s name on the kite, Shelley had drawn a heart with an arrow through it. She also wrote the words “vascular dementia.”
She flew the kite from the courtyard of Prestige Care’s Discovery Nursing & Rehab facility in Hazel Dell in recognition of World Alzheimer’s Day. Her husband has Alzheimer’s disease and lives in a nearby facility in Vancouver. Shelley is the one with vascular dementia, which was brought on by a stroke.
Five other women, some of them also diagnosed with dementia, flew kites alongside Shelley on Sunday afternoon. Supported by helium-filled purple balloons, the white kites drifted up above the courtyard’s trees.
One kite had “retired teacher” written on it. Another proclaimed: “I am a mother, daughter, grandmother.” Others sported a drawing of a book or a cupcake.
“We made them personal,” said Vivian Padden, activities assistant at the facility. “They had lives before this hit them. … It’s a very personal disease that affects a lot of people. It’s a life forgotten.”
Shelley Lafayette, 77, said she still remembers much from her life on a good day, but her husband of 58 years isn’t as well off.
Shelley used to work as a nurse at Bess Kaiser Hospital in Portland, “and I loved that,” she said. She and her husband, who worked for the Bonneville Power Administration, had four children together — two girls and twin boys.
“I can see what’s going on with him, and I don’t want to do that,” she said of her husband, now 83. “I’m scared to death, but what can I do? So I’ll just see how it plays out.”
World Alzheimer’s Day is Sept. 21 each year. It’s a time when organizations aim to raise awareness about the disease.
Alzheimer’s is the most common form of dementia and is the sixth-leading cause of death in the United States, according to the Alzheimer’s Association. Its symptoms usually show up first as mild memory loss, but as the disease progresses, patients can no longer “carry on a conversation or respond to their environment,” according to the association’s website.
So far, there is no cure for the disease, but some treatments can help slow symptoms, and research is ongoing.
Earlier this year, the Discovery Nursing & Rehab facility participated in the Walk to End Alzheimer’s in Portland, helping Prestige Care raise tens of thousands of dollars for the cause, said Chelsea Serface, the facility’s activities director.
Once a week, Serface said, she leads a watercolor painting class for residents with dementia. It gives them a chance to paint and tell Serface a story, which she writes down for them in pencil on the other side of the painting once it’s dried.
It’s not necessarily about learning art skills, she said. “It’s about how they feel when they are doing it.”
One resident’s painting recently was auctioned off by the Oregon chapter of the Alzheimer’s Association to raise money for the organization, Serface said.
Shelley Lafayette says she keeps busy at Discovery Nursing & Rehab by helping other residents any way she can.
“I talk to them, spend time with them,” she said. “It gives me the chance to be a nurse again.”
She also reads her medical books and has attended classes at Clark College about aging and its effects on the brain. “I hope to start taking more classes again,” she said. “Whether I can remember them or not, I don’t care.”
She’s lived at Discovery for more than six years, and previously served on its resident council. Her son brings her husband by for visits regularly. She said sometimes she can remember things; sometimes she can’t.
Despite her challenges, Shelley appeared happy on Sunday as she watched a staff member untangle her kite’s string and get the kite back into the air. It rested briefly on the roof of the building, and Shelley coaxed it along, saying, “Come on, baby, don’t give up now.”
As the kite lifted off the roof, she laughed and thanked the woman who’d helped her.
