It crept up on them slowly and at first it had been a bit of a joke between them: Aiden's little slips; his inability to find the word he wanted and that Julia would supply; his failure to recall the name of a client.
Aiden was building up his reputation as an architect and was working long hours, and so they put it down to anxiety or stress.
"You need a break," Julia had said, "get away from it all for a couple of weeks," and so they took a couple of weeks off from work, going to a seaside resort, but nothing changed. They would make an arrangement in the morning to do something in the afternoon, but when the afternoon arrived Aiden would have forgotten the arrangement.
A week after they returned home their son Patrick asked Julia, "What's the matter with dad, I said good morning to him and he looked at me as if he'd never seen me before."
It was at that point it was decided Aiden should see their doctor. He was sent off for tests and after that came the devastating report, "I'm sorry to have to tell you that you have the early stages of Alzheimer's disease."
"But that's not possible," Julia had gasped, "that's a disease for old people, not for a fit thirty two year old man."
"I'm sorry," the doctor said again, "but it happens. There have been teenagers diagnosed with Alzheimer's. What I can do," he said to Aiden, "is to give you some medication that may slow down the progress of the disease."
"There's no cure?" Julia had asked.
The doctor looked embarrassed as he had to tell her that there was no cure.
* * * * * * * *
Aiden and Julia had met while they were both studying at the university; the handsome, personable and aspiring Aiden and in his eyes, the gorgeous Julia.
She was tall and statuesque and beautiful in that divine way normally associated with Greek goddesses, the straight nose, upstanding breasts, her long neck, and her looks were matched by the grace of her movements and a dignity rarely seen in one so young.
Both of them had engaged in a number of brief affairs, but at their first meeting they had said to them selves, "That's The One," and nothing thereafter had changed their minds. Julia had often said that if marriages were made in heaven then certainly their marriage was. She did allow that some marriages seemed to have been made in hell, but not hers.
Strong, fit and an ardent lover, Aiden had been all she had hoped for in a marriage partner, and whereas in many cases the birth of a child, despite rumours to the contrary, could break up a marriage, the birth of Patrick had accorded with the rumours and had bound them together in an even closer bond of love.
Everything had seemed to be as perfect as it could be for Julia until that at first little cloud had appeared over the clear sky of their lives, and had grown ever more ominous until their lives seemed to inhabit in the darkness of Aiden's sickness.
The medication did little or nothing to slow the onset of the disease, and there came a time when Aiden had to stop working and stay at home.
Julia, assistant curator at the State Art Gallery, had to continue working to provide an income. Patrick was thirteen and in the early stages of high school, and this meant that Aiden was at home alone. This led to the first near catastrophic event.
It seemed that Aiden had started to cook a fillet of fish in a pan of oil, and had forgotten about it. The oil had caught fire and had it not been for their neighbour seeing smoke pouring out of the kitchen window the whole house might have gone up in flames.
This meant that drastic measures had to be taken, and a woman was employed to stay with Aiden while Julia was at work and Patrick at school. This was followed by the daily visits of a nurse, but as Aiden began to lose control of his bowels and bladder further measures had to be taken.
The choice was between Julia staying at home and thus they would lose their income, or her continuing to work and putting Aiden into a nursing home.
It was their doctor supported by the nurse, who said to Julia, "He's never going to get any better, only worse, and you won't be able to cope." And so the decision was made to put Aiden into the nursing home.
Julia visited him regularly three times a week, and on other occasions when she could, sometimes accompanied by Patrick, but the time came when Aiden no longer knew them apart from brief moments of lucidity.
It broke Julia's heart when during those moments of lucidity Aiden asked, "What am I doing here, I want to go home." Even before Julia had said, "You're not well darling, and you can't come home until; you're better," the moment had passed and Aiden might ask her, "Who are you?"
And so Julia, at the age of thirty seven, found her self with a ruined marriage, heavy nursing home bills to meet, and a seventeen years old son to support.
* * * * * * * *
Aiden had been very sexually potent, and Julia had met his potency with her own challenging libido. Theirs had been a joyful and free giving sexual relationship, but that had come to a stop with the progress of Aiden's disease.
A woman of strong religious commitment she prayed long and hard for her particular deity to turn the situation around. It seemed that the deity was either not listening or had gone on vacation.
There were grounds on which Julia could have divorced Aiden and remarried or perhaps taken a lover, but she did neither. Because of her religious allegiance she would not countenance either divorce or the taking of a lover while Aiden remained alive.
Patrick proved to be a very loyal and supportive son, and as the financial situation became increasingly difficult he went to work in the evenings and weekends at The Spaghetti House and this brought in a few extra dollars.
Julia's mother, a widow, had been left a little money mainly through investments, and she helped where she could, and it was through her mother that some degree of financial equilibrium came about, although the means was unwelcome.
Julia's mother died and left all her assets to Julia. It was far from a fortune, but it did make life a little easier.
Sexually Julia seemed to have closed the shutters. It was not that she did not have opportunities for sexual indulgence, far from it. Some of the men who subtly or openly suggested a "meaningful relationship," surprised and at times alarmed Julia.
