Skinny Dad

As I mentioned earlier, upon visiting my dad one Father's Day, I became alarmed at how thin he and his girlfriend had become. All though dad dieted on and off most of his adult life, (who doesn't these days?) he was never really overweight.

The next day I called him. I started to ask him what he had eaten. He would respond in his weakend voice that he skipped breakfast on a daily basis. He said that he and his girlfriend (suffering from Alzheimer's) usually split a sandwich for lunch. Dinner was a cup of soup! Yikes! They were severly under nurished and starving themselves to death without even knowing it! :(

When I expressed my concern, Dad said they were fine. He added that at their age they just weren't hungry and did not require much food. Well, yeah! One of them could not remember having eaten or not and the other one did not have enough energy to get out of bed!

This was bad, very bad. I asked if his girlfriend didn't cook dinner anymore. That's when dad finally let me in on the big secret of her Alzheimers. He said she was confused in the kitchen, so it became unsafe for her to cook anymore.

That's when I told dad that he was going to have to cook the meals from now on. When I pointed out the fact that they were only eating 400 or so calories a day, even dad had to admit that it was not enough to keep a bird alive.