Product Description

Previously published in HC as Dancing With Rose

One journalist’s riveting—and surprisingly hopeful— in-the-trenches view of Alzheimer’s

Nearly five million people in the United States are living with Alzheimer’s. Like many children of Alzheimer’s sufferers, Lauren Kessler, an accomplished journalist, was devastated by the disease that seemed to erase her mother’s identity even before claiming her life. But suppose people with Alzheimer’s are not slates wiped blank. Suppose they experience friendship and loss, romance and jealousy, joy and sorrow? To better understand this debilitating condition, Kessler enlists as a bottom-of-the-rung caregiver at an Alzheimer’s facility and learns lessons that challenge what we think we know about the disease. A compelling, clear-eyed, and emotionally resonant narrative, Finding Life in the Land of Alzheimer’s offers a new optimistic look at what the disease can teach us and a much-needed tonic for those faced with providing care for someone they love.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #413275 in Books
• Published on: 2007-05-31
• Released on: 2007-05-31
• Format: Bargain Price
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 272 pages

From Publishers Weekly
The growing number of readers who have relatives with Alzheimer's will warm to Kessler's excellent account of the months she worked as an unskilled resident assistant in an Alzheimer's facility on the West Coast. This facility, which she calls Maplewood, is a state-of-the-art institution, divided into small "neighborhoods" of 14 rooms with private baths, a common space and enclosed patios. The author of several nonfiction books, Kessler (Full Court Press) was attempting to resolve her feelings after her own mother, with whom she had a troubled relationship, died of Alzheimer's; bittersweet memories of her are scattered through the narrative. At Maplewood, Kessler feeds, toilets and converses with residents in varying stages of the illness. Marianne, for instance, an alert and well-dressed woman, appears not to belong at Maplewood. She still regards herself as a successful working woman, and the author treats her as such. Kessler becomes strongly attached to some of the other men and women in her neighborhood, feeling bereaved when several die during her tenure. She comes to regard Alzheimer's sufferers as individuals who can still enjoy life, given the care and recreational opportunities extended at this facility—a powerful lesson in the humanity of those we often see as tragically bereft of that quality. (June 4)
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From Booklist
Assigned to write about Alzheimer's disease, Kessler took a page from a handful of notable journalistic predecessors. She chucked her notebook and immersed herself in the atmosphere and culture of an Alzheimer's residential facility near her home. Taking several months out of her cushy journalist's life, she worked there for minimum wage as a resident assistant (RA), the bottom job at the nursing home and one with high turnover. Indeed, many newbies don't return after the two-day orientation, much less make it to the three-month first "anniversary." Despite a high-minded description having to do with care and dignity, the RA's work is on the front line when it comes to residents' (not "patients'") bathing, using the toilet, dressing, feeding, corralling, and cleaning up. Kessler's experience was eye-opening, to say the least, more so because she was still lugging the weighty baggage of guilt she acquired from her response to her mother's Alzheimer's eight years previously. Invaluable intelligence, especially for anyone considering a residential facility for a loved one. Chavez, Donna

Review
Are you ready to step through the looking glass? Lauren Kessler's book gently walks you into the strange and unsettling world of middle and late-stage Alzheimer's. And she does it the way it should be done: with open eyes, complete honesty, and a true compassion -- no cornball sentimentality, no pulled punches. It takes a special quality to turn a subject this agonizing into an absorbing read, and this book has it. -- David Shenk, author of The Forgetting

Lauren Kessler has confronted the horror of Alzheimer's in the most direct and courageous way possible: After losing a mother to the disease, she went to work as a low-wage aide in an Alzheimer's facility. DANCING WITH ROSE is itself a kind of miracle of caring: She manages to humanize the victims and shine a clear, compassionate, light on those who struggle to care for them. Anyone affected by the disease-- and that's almost everyone -- has to read this book! -- Barbara Ehrenreich, author of Nickel and Dimed and Bait and Switch

Lauren Kessler, who sent her parent away to a 'care facility' as so many of us do, here attempts a small act of atonement. But she achieves much more. In taking us on her months-long visit to the foreign land of Alzheimer's (a place which embodies so many of our fears), Kessler helps the reader to see that people with this disease are people we can touch, speak to, empathize with, and--more than I had known was possible--understand. -- Ted Conover, Author of New Jack: Guarding Sing Sing and Coyotes

Part immersion reportage, part memoir, Lauren Kessler's book shows that people with Alzheimer's are still capable of love, friendship, and humor. Unflinching and smart, repentant and honest, Dancing With Rose offers ways for all of us to connect with people at the end of their lives. I loved this book. -- Melissa Fay Greene, author of There's No Me Without You and Praying for Sheetrock

Customer Reviews

A Perfect Philosophy
"I don't remember what we did, ... but that doesn't matter. It was sure fun while it was happening," observes Vivian, when asked about her day.

What could be a more perfect philosophy?

Vivian resides in "Maplewood" (pseudonym), the Alzheimer's care facility in Oregon where Lauren Kessler worked as a resident assistant while researching her recently released book, Dancing with Rose. The book not only reflects the anger, repulsion, fear, and guilt I experienced during the three years my Alzheimer's-stricken mother spent dying in a nursing home, it addresses those feelings without sentimentality and with close observation of the individuals (and we do see the residents as individuals) under Ms Kessler's care. In the process, my perceptions of the disease, the people who care for these patients, and the nature of an Alzheimer's existence radically changed, quite a feat in only 257 pages.

I have always respected the aids in these "homes." I know I don't have the physical and emotional strength to take care of all the physical needs of even one, let alone a dozen, Alzheimer's patients as they do day-in-day-out for minimum wage under austere, if not hostile, working conditions. It is outrageous how little they earn or are appreciated and amazing that they persist in providing such devoted care. My new respect is for the patients themselves and the redefined lives they carve out for themselves at each stage of their illness, finding joy in the small pleasures of the moment - the feel of warm flannel or a stuffed animal, the comfort of hugging or holding hands, the taste of ice cream. Despite the straightforward writing, I often cried as I read.

By the end, I agreed with Ms Kessler that there is joy and dignity in even these radically altered lives and that we can all benefit from assuming a similarly Zen approach to living. And as she points out, there are worse fates, more painful endings.

An honest, moving memoir
I am in the midst of caring for my father who is in the early stages of dementia. I watched his mother, my grandmother, suffer with Alzheimer's for almost ten years before she passed away fifteen years ago. Ms. Kessler's book strikes perfect chords of truth time after time. It is almost odd to say I enjoyed traveling her journey with her, but I guess what is more accurate is that she was an outstanding guide and reporter in a world that is so familiar to me and others who have been touched by this experience. Her thoughtful honesty with both her patient's lives as well as her own made this memoir one of the best I've ever read. A wonderful book that I recommend highly to anyone.

Changing my view
It is only an eroding sense of discipline that quells my impulse to gush to the author: thank you, thank you, thank you...

Two years ago I rented out my house in Los Angeles to live with and care for my parents (both 87 years old this year) in Central Calif. Visiting Oregon last week I found this book, was unable to separate myself from it and wished that on my way back to California I could drop by Eugene to meet Lauren Kessler.

The positive impact of this book is enormous. My view of my Mother and dementia is being changed and in the process I am gaining courage and inspiration.

The story has deeply moved me. When I first started reading the book I found it difficult to breathe. As the story developed and the people came to life I found myself also caring about them, found myself weeping and laughing. But, importantly, able to breathe and learn.