"My wife has become completely disabled. I can't bear the thought of spending the rest of my life beside her" (a husband). It's true—it is unbearable suffering when accident or grave illness strips a spouse of the ability to be a partner, to offer support, to be fully present as they once were.
The bond of love and trust between them has shattered because the other has changed. "I don't recognize her anymore. She's not the same person."
How does one live in this new reality? How does one accept, day after day until the end of life, this new fragility of one's spouse? First, one must grieve. Not the loss of a temporary illness with the promise of recovery and restoration—but the loss of a marriage as it was lived for perhaps decades.
This is irreversible change. Radical change. And it will be painful for both.
Accepting this new reality takes time. There will be denial: "This can't be happening." Anger: "This is unbearable. It's unjust." Depression: "I can't go on." Then one day, perhaps, a shift in the heart: "Yes. I accept her and love her as she is now."
A friend—a retired businessman—told me about his wife struck by Alzheimer's disease. He refused to place her in a clinic. Instead, he kept her at home and, with some help, learned to bathe her, dress her, feed her. One day he said to me: "I'm becoming more human."
One night his wife woke him. For a moment she had emerged from the thick fog of her disease. She said to him: "Darling, I want to thank you for everything you do for me." Then she sank back into the fog. He wept at those words for a long time. In that instant, he could feel her presence—truly present, truly herself.
To walk these stages, one needs accompaniment: a doctor, a psychologist, a priest, a network of friends who together help navigate this tragedy and hold the often unbearable emotions it brings. And if the time comes to place one's loved one in a care facility, one needs help to make that decision and live with it.
How does one face the future without being consumed by dread? If we struggle to find strength in the present moment, we will never find strength for what lies ahead. God is "I am." God is present. Even in unbearable suffering, there are sometimes moments of light. This spouse, so radically changed, has become a presence of God. Jesus said: "Whatever you did for the least of these, you did for me" (Matthew 25). To live this mystery—Jesus hidden in "poverty"—we need the "neighbor."
Jean Vanier, 2005
From "Ombres et Lumière", no. 154