on watching a parent slip back into childhood . . . and you're helpless to stop the slide.

I've written before about my dad's illness; he had a stroke in February, losing much of the use of his left side, which has not improved.
An emerging side effect is his diminishing mental capacity. This is terribly, terribly hard. He's always been the commander in chief of our family. Now he's like a little boy we have to cajole and prod. Sometimes he's happy, but often he's cranky and pessimistic. And heck, who can blame him?
My sister Virginia lives in the same town as Dad, and she's been a wonder, going every day, often two or three times, to his nursing care facility (the new term for nursing home) to make sure he's getting the care he needs.

Dad at Easter with Virginia's kids -- my neiphlings

She is fearless. She checks him physically for injuries, bed sores, chaffing -- things I would not want to do. She makes sure he's eating right, and getting the right meds -- and not getting the wrong ones.
Without her relentless pursuit and expectation of excellence from the center, he wouldn't be doing as well as he is, I'm certain.
I'm in charge of the financial part. Ug.
More about that another time.
As for Dad's essence -- his indomitable personality -- we seem to be slowly losing him. And God! It's heartbreaking.
We'll get calls from him desperately asking for help, because he's on an airplane he doesn't belong on, or he's on a ship at sea and afraid, or, horribly, he's being eaten by a bear and needs immediate assistance.
Virginia "caught" the bear and had it shipped out into the countryside for release into the wild.
The time he was on a ship at sea, he wondered how she would return to land. No problem: She caught a helicopter ride back home, and called to tell him she'd arrived safely.
It would be funny if it weren't so desperately sad.
There's no point trying to convince him he's not experiencing these things, as they are real to him. So we play along unless he gets scared, and then we come up with some way to whisk him out of the fantasy.
He has a terrific roommate who has helped Dad more than once when he dove headfirst out of bead, knocking himself silly because he forgot he can't walk, or was reaching for something he'd dropped.
Anyone who has watched a loved one go through an illness knows the heartbreak of watching a formerly strong person become weak and dependent.
When the person's mind starts to go, it's somehow much worse. Our mother died of cancer 15 years ago, and that was hard. But she was sharp until the end, and much more able to enjoy life than Dad is now.
He has to know he's not quite right. He's filled with anxiety. And I can't fix this for him.
That's the awful part. My five brothers and sisters and I can't fix this for our daddy.
So we talk with him every day, assuring him he's safe, reminding him to look to the left for the window next to his bed, and the black spruce outside that lets him know he's safe in his room, where he belongs.
We listen to his concerns, and help as best as we can. I try to remember to pay his bills.
I guess that's all we can do.
And do and do and do. He calls me around 50 - 60 times a day. I can't answer all those calls of course,  but I speak to him several times. So does Virginia, and our other siblings.

Dad has always had a great sense of humor. Here he is dressed as Dr. Who

Dad is still in there, and from time to time we get a glimpse of that humorous, sarcastic wit -- that sharp intellect that allowed him to be an analyst for a large corporation, and that allowed him to be a first generation Marine Corps fighter pilot in the 1950s. The charm that won him an intelligent, witty wife, and the determination that allowed him to raise six children and keep a roof over everyone's head, and food in our stomachs all those years.
I just wish I could still have heart to hearts with him, or even a conversation where he was the grown-up, and I was was the "kid" looking for advice or comfort.
It's a topsy-turvy world, and my amusement-park-ride-car has flipped right upside down. I'm just trying not to fall out, and my brothers and sisters and I, and all our children, are hanging on until it rights itself again.
But when it does, I fear Dad won't be in the car.