Abstract:
How can hope, love and faith stay alive when dementia enters a home? In this article I shall
look especially at the spouse or partner who shares an abode with a person with dementia.
Most of the authors in this field, also John Swinton who is perhaps the best known author
whose books are written from a (practical) theological perspective, focus on care in institutions,
that means care by professionals. A partner living with a dementia patient has two main roles:
as partner and caregiver. Night and day a partner is witness to the ongoing deterioration of her
or his beloved partner, without being a professional. This article is founded not only on
literature about dementia patients, but also on the experiences of several partners, as well as
my own experiences as a partner. The question we all ask is: ‘From where does our strength
come?’ I argue that what is said in the literature on the subject of (the pastoral care for) dementia
patients does not help the partners, because it lays a heavy burden on them, who are already
suffering from feelings of grief and guilt. I do not agree with John Swinton’s idea that God
created dementia. Looking for different ways of thinking about God and faith to survive with
hope and love, I turn to the exegesis of the creation stories by Ellen van Wolde. These give the
opportunity to take the evil of the situation of the deterioration of the personality of a patient
with dementia seriously, and at the same time grant the possibility to turn the grief and guilt
feelings into strength to fight evil, together with a God whose empathy and love stays with a
partner in her or his loneliness and grief.
