My dad has Lewy Body Dementia which affects a lot of things about a person both cognitively (fluctuations in thinking - especially decision making and problem solving - and hallucinations) and physically (autonomic systems and Parkinson-like symptoms). For many people, it ends up also changing their personality from sweet and mild mannered to paranoid, accusatorial, and mean - it's a horrible disease that causes confusion, memory lapses, and hallucinations but also can cause the filter to go away when the person with the disease is dealing with their loved ones or caregivers.
However, my dad's nature has not always been sweet and quiet. I have come to realize that my dad has fought anxiety all of his life with no therapy and no medications until he was over 65 (occasional Xanax) and no SSRIs until he was 75. He self-medicated with manhattans or martinis and still says a glass of wine helps him relax. He actually says the anxiety helped him in his career. Maybe it did but it made for an interesting childhood and life, at least for me and probably my two older brothers - but they were boys so it was different for them.
Luckily, he had jobs where he traveled a lot or worked a lot so he wasn't around half of each week. My mom was very level-headed and seemed to keep his anxiety away from us pretty well. I have memories though of when he would go on a cleaning rampage around the house wanting everything to be in their place. He would even get upset if a library book I was reading was out on an end table, though that is where it belonged. He also was horrible to have around if a car was being packed for a trip - his anxiety and difficulties with spatial problems were a bad combination. My mom would send him back into the house.
However, when he got upset, he got upset - not physically - just emotionally. He did not keep his cool very easily at all. I learned most of the swear words as a kid just hearing him argue with my mother growing up. When he got angry at me when I was a kid, he could drive me to tears in seconds and then tell me to turn off the waterworks. He never understood how to relate to a daughter. He mocked me after I tried to start playing team sports when I was 12. He didn't understand how that made me feel. He was not good in school but had incredible social skills which was perfect for his occupation and helped when I started branching out socially and let grades not be my only focus. As long as I didn't do anything to upset my mom, I flew under his radar most of the time.
My mom was diagnosed with breast cancer in January 1985. She had a mastectomy followed by a full hysterectomy a month or so later. Then it was chemotherapy. Then radiation. Then tamoxifen for a year. Then that stopped working and she passed away about a year later...February 1988. He confided in me when I was 16 that he would leave my mom if she did an experimental treatment because he didn't want to be married to a vegetable but was afraid that everyone would think he was an a**hole if he did. She didn't do it. Probably would not have helped anyway, she died when I was 17.
He could get me to sobbing over the phone in college as my roommate and best friend witnessed many a time. Years later, when I was 32 and I was getting divorced, I called my oldest brother and asked him to tell our dad that I refused to speak to him again if he kept getting mad at me because he didn't trust that I could do what was best for me and my kids (I still live in the same house, I think I managed the divorce settlement quite well). My dad told me to marry rich the 2nd time around, that didn't happen.
My 2nd husband even said he would divorce me if I ever left him alone in the car with my dad again only 6 weeks after married me. All they were doing was trying to find a parking spot in a crowded tourist area. My dad bought hook, line, and sinker into Fox News and assumed that they were only ones telling the truth - though he admitted he liked finding a news source that "thought" like he did so he had to know it was biased - well, his favorite song is "My Way" by Frank Sinatra - so maybe he did.
My dad has the ability to get me worked up often even now, but I knew that fact when he got wonky in summer of 2018 and I said that he should come live by me while we figured things out (him and his girlfriend who already had Alzheimer's but who we thought was a saint for being with my dad for over 10 years). My dad was diagnosed with LBD 3 months after moving here. Now he's been here for almost 3 years and he's becoming more confused, more paranoid, angrier, and less thankful for the help I provide...but at least I usually get a hug and a thank you when I leave - often after being sworn at and accused of everything ludicrous under the sun. However, I am grateful for the times he is thankful.
It helps to write this out. I love my dad but he's never been a person that I would choose to be around just because I enjoyed his company, that was my mom who we lost over 30 years ago. Everyone else loves being around him and finds him to be charming, even now he is still pretty good at "show timing" though that is getting harder to do. Watching a man who independently traveled all over the country for around 10 years deteriorate is hard, I can only imagine how hard it is for him.
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