My husband has been dealing with some bowel issues over the past month or so and we finally seem to be getting back to normal. But what will that look like? Every time something happens in his body the paradigm shifts and usually not for the better. I’ve been providing additional assistance in some areas; will that need to continue forever? Should I be pushing him to do more himself in an attempt to get us back where we were before this episode or let it go with the assumption that his capabilities have changed?

I know that I am not the only CarePartner who struggles with these questions. My husband gets sick or injured and I step in to do more for him as he is recovering. At what point, if ever, does that additional help need to stop? Is it unrealistic to expect things to get back to exactly the way they were since I know that Parkinson’s is a progressive illness? Why do these episodes always seem to take our normal a bit further along the spectrum?

In case I haven’t said this in a while, I hate this disease. I hate what it is doing to my husband, I hate what it is doing to our relationship, and honestly, I hate what it is doing to me.  I miss having a normal day with my husband where we would converse over coffee, work around the house together or maybe go out and run errands, make dinner together and then play a game or share a program on tv. That vision of life doesn’t exist anymore thanks to this diagnosis, yet I still get up and keep moving each and every day through strength and gratitude for what we do have. Our current normal is nowhere near what I expected for us in retirement but it is enough, because we are both still here and working together to make it through.