Lily once raced through the door shouting \u201cGRANDPA!\u201d and launching into Jim\u2019s arms. He was her \u201cfavorite person.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n
But during a weeklong visit, she suddenly refused to hug him goodnight. Later she whispered, \u201cGrandma\u2026 <\/p>\n\n\n\n
he\u2019s different.\u201d She had seen him crying alone at the kitchen table. \u201cGrandpa never cries. He looked\u2026 small.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I began noticing changes\u2014forgetfulness, frustration, hidden papers. When I finally confronted him, he admitted the truth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Doctors had used the word \u201cearly.\u201d Then he said it plainly: \u201cEarly dementia\u2026 Alzheimer\u2019s is possible.\u201d He had been scared and didn\u2019t want to feel like \u201ca burden.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We told our family. I explained to Lily that \u201cGrandpa\u2019s brain is going through something hard.\u201d She asked, \u201cIs he still Grandpa?\u201d Yes, he was.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
She hugged him tightly and said, \u201cNo more secrets.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
For now, he is still here. And for now, that is enough.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Lily once raced through the door shouting \u201cGRANDPA!\u201d and launching into Jim\u2019s arms. He was her \u201cfavorite person.\u201d But during a weeklong visit, she suddenly refused to hug him goodnight. Later she whispered, \u201cGrandma\u2026 he\u2019s different.\u201d She had seen him crying alone at the kitchen table. \u201cGrandpa never cries. He looked\u2026 small.\u201d I began noticing…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":14108,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_kad_post_transparent":"","_kad_post_title":"","_kad_post_layout":"","_kad_post_sidebar_id":"","_kad_post_content_style":"","_kad_post_vertical_padding":"","_kad_post_feature":"","_kad_post_feature_position":"","_kad_post_header":false,"_kad_post_footer":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14107","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/horizonvibe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14107","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/horizonvibe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/horizonvibe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/horizonvibe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/horizonvibe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=14107"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/horizonvibe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14107\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14109,"href":"https:\/\/horizonvibe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14107\/revisions\/14109"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/horizonvibe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/14108"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/horizonvibe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=14107"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/horizonvibe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=14107"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/horizonvibe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=14107"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}