How do I support my parent who suffers from Alzheimer’s?

This is such an important question because the impairment that happens in Alzheimer’s stretches our preconceived ideas of how to care for people and how to minister to them. What I mean by that is we tend to be overly reliant on a person’s intellectual and cognitive capacity. We explain the good news. We argue theological points. We challenge incorrect thoughts. We converse about ideas and we discuss motives. The leading edge of our ministry and our care tends to be dependent on a person’s ability to understand what is true and real. Therefore, the biggest obstacle in ministering to a loved one with Alzheimer's is that there is the subtraction of something that we typically depend on, and often an addition of something that we’re not prepared for. Though our ministry to those with Alzheimer’s is hindered by the subtraction of their cognitive and intellectual capacities, and the addition of the unusual and unexpected, and these would be things like paranoia and delusions and personality change.

So when our routine strategies of care and ministry bump up against these deficits and limitations, what do we do? How do we support a parent who has Alzheimer’s? The answer is simply going to be a shift in emphasis. Caring for someone with Alzheimer’s does not require a radical paradigm shift, rather an emphasis on a different dimension of Christian care and helping. So in caring for someone with Alzheimer's, the emphasis is on what might be described as a ministry of presence and a ministry of reassurance.

Our first ministry to our loved one suffering from Alzheimer’s is the ministry of presence. It recognizes the profound importance of us incarnating and embodying God’s presence in our relationships. We are ambassadors and representatives of the presence of God to his people. For those with Alzheimer’s, your presence is going to be the primary means by which Christ is known and experienced.

There’s a great scene in the movie Lars and the Real Girl that captures the ministry of presence perfectly. Lars and the Real Girl is about a struggling young man who buys a life-sized doll to be his girlfriend and eventually his wife. And in the course of the movie this imaginary, artificial spouse dies. And in spite of his bizarre behavior, Lars’s rural Wisconsin community rallies around him and takes care of him. And in the scene I’m referring to, some older women come over to his house and sit with him and they begin to knit and crochet. And when Lars asks them what they’re doing there, the women respond, “We came over to sit.” That is what people do when tragedy strikes. They come over and sit. This vignette is a great example of the ministry of presence. Something as ordinary as physical proximity is all of a sudden loaded with meaning and power.

Our second ministry to our loved ones with Alzheimer’s is a ministry of reassurance. For many suffering with Alzheimer’s, on top of the cognitive decline, there is also paranoia, delusion, and bizarre personality changes. Our care for them is not to correct them or try and convince them otherwise. Instead, our care for them will look like a persistent, subtle reassurance towards what is true. A ministry of reassurance will reassure and redirect them to who they are in Christ, and who God is for them in Christ. I might sound something like this: “Dad, I want you to know that you’re safe, even if you don’t feel that way. Jesus is with you. You have nothing to worry about. You are his son and he is your God.” Or, “Mom, I know that you’re unsettled. I want you to trust me that the promises of Psalm 121 hold true. Jesus is near to you. He is your keeper and he will keep your coming and your going, forever.” The ministry of reassurance can be an exhausting one. You will likely be saying the same thing often. You will repeat yourself again and again and again. However, it doesn’t change the fact that this is what your loved one needs and it is the best way to come alongside them, to support them, and to care for them.

So how do I help a parent who suffers from Alzheimer’s? For the subtraction and the loss of cognitive abilities caused by Alzheimer’s, we prioritize presence, the ministry of presence. And for the addition of irrational thoughts and bizarre perception caused by Alzheimer’s, we prioritize reassurance, a ministry of reassurance.