A Bit about Jack, a tiny bit about
me, and more about us:
Jack is 77, a Korean War Veteran, a major sweetheart, and suffers from
Alzheimer's Disease. He
spent the early part of his life nurturing and supporting his first wife
and their three sons. During this time, he also built and raced Go Carts.
He even owned a Go Cart track on Long Island for a while. He was known
as Jack the Giant Killer!
In late 1978, his back was broken when his vehicle was forced off
a cliff. While he was recuperating from that, in April of 1979, his
first wife, Yvonne, contracted and died of cancer. He was
devastated, and still mourns her.
When he was able to function again, he began a new career helping small
business owners to run their businesses more efficiently. He held
workshops and seminars all over the U.S. of A., Canada, Australia, and in
Great Britain. While he was doing this, he met me, Cynthia, with a
group of friends in a pizza parlour. He asked me out shortly after
that, and we had our first date on my 32nd Birthday, in February 1983.
Although I told him BEFORE we went out that I was a confirmed
Bachelorette and had NO interest in marrying, he just ignored that bit.
By September he'd convinced me to be his bride, and we were wed.
Since then we've lived and worked together day in and day out. This
September (2010) will be our 27th wedding anniversary!
Jack's parents were getting on in years, so he arranged for them to
move from Long Island to California. When his Dad began to become
more frail, we bought a house and moved his parents in with us.
Jack's Dad, Ian, was a wonderful man, and we are both happy that we were
able to spend time with him before he died. Jack's Mum eventually
developed Dementia, which her doctors said was probably Alzheimer's
Disease, and eventually died from it.
On New Year's Eve 1997, our house in Discovery Bay, California, was
flooded. It stayed that way for three months, with the depth of the
flooding going up and down with the tides. F.E.M.A. declared our
home unfit for human habitation, told us that we couldn't sell it, and
ordered us to move out. This was awful for us, as selling our house,
eventually, was our retirement plan. Now our retirement was
derailed.
While we were looking for a place to move that we could afford, one of
Jack's sons came to visit. He told us that the guy who'd been
caretaking his Tollhouse property, rent-free, had to leave, and asked if
we'd be interested in replacing him. We discussed it and agreed
that, although it would wipe out part of our meager savings to have to
move twice - once to be caretakers and again to wherever we could
afford - we really had no choice. After all, as most everyone knows,
you always help family no matter what.
We moved to Critter Haven (we named it that) in July 1998, at the
Landlord's request. Unfortunately, once we moved in, we were told that we had to pay rent,
which we did until our savings were gone. That wiped out our plans
to move to a place of our own, as we could no longer afford it.
Meanwhile, as the years rolled by, we cared for hundreds of abused,
abandoned, and/or unwanted Critters, found homes for most of them, and
continued to support those whom no one wanted to adopt. That's now
come to an end. We were ordered to get rid of the Critters, and, a
few days later, we were ordered to move off the property.
As you can imagine, this is all extremely bad for Jack's Alzheimer's.
It's common knowledge that changing a dementia patient's environment and/or
routines, and continuously stressing someone in this condition, causes
acceleration of symptoms. We don't understand why Jack's son is doing
this to his father.
We don't know what to do at this point. Our only income is Jack's Social
Security. On that, we can afford about $400 per month for rent, or a
bit more if we
give up eating.
Where can one rent a house in the Country or the Boonies (or anywhere
else) for that?
We really do need to stay out of towns or cities, as Jack is accustomed to
country living and all the noise and crowding in town are bad for
him. If we could find somewhere that we could afford to live, we
would still have no money for moving expenses. Our hope is that we
can find somewhere affordable and get help with moving our stuff before
anything more drastic happens.
Is there an Adoption Agency for abused, abandoned, and unwanted Codgers
and Codgerettes?
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