Yesterday my wife and I helped her friend’s father, who is preparing to move out of his large, luxurious and extensively landscaped home. His wife, an active kayaker, is an even more avid gardener, and the property was filled with pots and gardening accessories which we were there to take away, because they are sadly no longer needed. She has dementia, and is now living in a memory care facility, her dementia having passed the point of her being able to safely live at home. Her husband is selling their home and following her to the assisted living community.
This is the inevitable outcome for every dementia patient. Alzheimer’s is the most recognizable and perhaps most scary sounding variant of this family of diseases, but there is no known treatment (the new Alzheimer’s drugs are still in the early testing phases, and at best purport to slow the process down, not halt or even less reverse it) and no known cure for any form of dementia. It can only and will only get worse.
I’ve watched and experienced how this process works, close up and first-hand with a very close relative of mine who is living through it now. I’ve taken courses with other people who are either now caregivers themselves or are, like myself, supporting other caregivers, and I learned about an entirely different way of living with and caring for people you love – and for dealing with permanent, inexorable loss.
The world of dementia, despite its incredible and tragic prevalence in the population, seems to be relatively misunderstood, or perhaps better said, not explained or discussed much. This fact, which certainly deserves much more exploration far beyond the scope of this brief reflection, has led, I believe, to the wrong questions being asked about Joe Biden’s viability as a presidential candidate, and a fundamental disrespect for what Joe Biden the man is going through.
Even though Biden has just announced that he will not continue his candidacy, and perhaps even precisely because of this fact, I believe these points are worth addressing.
On the first point, the question I have heard asked the most often is “can Biden win?”. The second is “is Biden too old?”. The first question is mooted by the second, in which “too old” is coded language for “suffering from cognitive decline/dementia”. The answer to the second question is sadly, but very obviously, ‘yes’. Thus the question is not if he can win (who can say really?), but rather would he be able to govern reliably for any length of time even if he did win.
To be clear, this is no implied criticism of Joe Biden’s skills. The disease is manifestly not his fault, and the way in which it is progressively robbing him of his capacity to effectively be the wily fox of a politician and elder statesman he was not so long ago is unstoppable. It does not improve, nor does it decline in a linear fashion, but can rather jump in leaps and bounds, without warning. Thus it sadly, painfully, disqualifies him from running for office again.
Which leads me to the second point, and that is how indescribably difficult this must be for Joe Biden and his family. He is being forced out of the running – as an incumbent – by a disease that is not fault. Though this in no way diminishes who he has been, it has irrevocably changed and will continue to change who he is. He must surrender everything he has worked for, set aside his self-image, and admit that his condition cannot be fought with stubborn resolve – or anything else.
To do this is an act of profound courage.
Thus, I only want to salute President Joe Biden at this moment, having learned of his decision to step aside in the US Presidential election just a short time ago. He has done the USA an incredible service, both over his long career as a lawmaker and then by defeating Donald Trump in 2020. His intricate knowledge of government and foreign policy allowed a swift transition back to a functioning White House, and that among all things should stand as a proud legacy.
Today President Biden has done the right thing for himself and the country. Now, he has the opportunity to do another good thing – tell the truth about his cognitive decline, an experience he shares, sadly, with countless millions of others – and help people just like him. That could possibly be his greatest legacy of all.
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