Shared story: I can honestly say I’ve been blessed through it all
Today’s Shared Story is by David Terriaco, currently living in Fort Myers, Florida.
We met in the Coach House on the campus of The Cincinnati Bible Seminary in 1972. The romance lasted a lifetime; we were married in 1974. In those early days, I never thought it would end. We were so young, and our lives were ahead of us.
Years later, as we sat at the edge of the church cemetery following homecoming at Liberty Christian Church in Georgia, an older couple walked passed us on the way to visit the grave of his first wife. I said to Ernestine, “One day, that will be us, old and still walking hand in hand.”
Little did I know what our future would hold. In 2011, we found ourselves in a neurologist’s office to hear the diagnosis: “Ernestine, you have Parkinson’s Disease.” With those words her eyes filled with tears. We were devastated.
Unexpected challenges
At first she was able to live life as usual, with an occasional twitch or a mild tremor. Later, medications were introduced to control the symptoms and other complications. Eventually she would take a disability leave from work, retire, become confined to a chair with limited mobility, and suffer the confusion of dementia.
Photo taken in 2018
I never expected this! We had talked about traveling when we retire, going to the places we never could visit earlier. Now this! It was hard to keep up with my job while also becoming the cook, housekeeper, bookkeeper, planner, and now caregiver. I never regretted it, but it was just difficult for reasons beyond what I have room to share.
One of my life savers was the counseling I received. A place where I could open up with a friend who listened and prayed with me. He recommended I take advantage of a “caregiver coach.” What a blessing she was to me. My greatest takeaway was a book: The 36-Hour Day. This reference book was filled with everything I was facing and answered so many questions that filled my head.
My counselor told me one day, “Friend, this is tough; you are slowly watching your wife die.” That hit hard. I still believed we would come out of this, so I filed the thought for another day. Only months later, July 18, 2019, Ernestine died.
New journey
There I was with the reality that my journey in life had taken a turn I never thought possible. My kids were fabulous as they tried to be strong for me and I for them, but we were all broken, stunned, confused, and yet hopeful. Following the funeral, everyone returned to their lives, and I was alone for the first time in my life. Fortunately, friends would surround me while God was fulfilling me, and I was fine.
Following Ernestine’s burial, I received word that Mom was in the hospital. I literally left the cemetery and headed to Florida to be there with my parents. My mother had also been diagnosed with Parkinson’s and dementia but was in the hospital for a UTI. She would later be released to a rehab facility in the midst of the COVID pandemic. Visiting became difficult for me but such a challenge at best for my dad.
Marilyn and Gene Terriaco
A few weeks later, she developed another UTI and was back in the hospital. We gathered around Dad as we saw her improve and then decline. She came home from the hospital with hospice care and died the next morning. It seemed like “déjà vu all over again.” The morning before she came home, Dad suffered a heart attack. He never was able to be with her and it broke his heart.
A caregiver again
In time, Dad recovered from the heart attack and insisted on taking care of himself. Reluctantly, my brother and I agreed. In December of that same year, he caught COVID and landed in the hospital for a few days and later would be transferred to rehab. I didn’t know how well he would do at 92 years of age, but in March 2021, he came home.
I took an unplanned retirement to become his caregiver. This meant completing a renovation at my house in North Carolina and readying it for someone else to occupy, filling a U-Haul trailer with everything I thought I should take with me, and moving to Fort Myers. I’m living there with my dad in his home today. (We snapped a picture, below, of his 94th birthday celebration last year.)
Counting my blessings
The past few years have felt much like a roller coaster ride. The first part was new and challenging. Since then, it would almost seem like a “never-ending journey.” I could complain about how horrible it all has been and feel completely justified. That, however, is canceled out with the reality that I’ve been blessed through it all.
I was employed by The Summit Church, a wonderful congregation that showed me incredible grace through my wife’s illness and the care of my parents. I saw friends step up to help with my wife’s care and many other needs before I began caring for my dad. My health remained strong, and the timing of each challenge was perfect.
Did I handle this right? Probably not, but I sure learned so much about myself and what it means to love someone. On June 15, 1974, I promised my wife to love her “in sickness and in health, ‘til death do us part.” I did that, and today I am so grateful that I could spend more than 45 years with her. This path so far has been the most fulfilling in my life.