By Adam Van Der Stoep

Read in 6 minutes

Published October 28, 2024

"She's Not Here": Alzheimer's And The Human Identity

The nurses shared that it wouldn’t be long. Maybe a day or so. Grandma Noreen was showing all of the signs. Her body was shutting down for good this time. She would soon pass. 

The only thing left for us as a family was to walk with her gently as she entered the shadowland of death.

We pulled up some folding chairs and squeezed in close around her bedside. She was sleeping peacefully. We knew this day would come.

Alzheimer’s. 

For the last 9 years of her life grandma struggled with this cruel and unforgiving disease.

It didn’t happen all at once, but over time, her memories began to fade and her personality began to change. Little by little, the bright light of her warm and engaging personality grew dim. And now in the end, her mind was completely stolen away from her and from us. 

As we sat together in that room of the nursing home sharing stories with laughter and tears, I began to wonder… 

What makes us who we are?

What grounds the sense of our human identity in the world?

What made grandma who she was?

As my mind began its investigation, I found no easy answers. 

Are we the sum of our own memories?

If that’s true, then, in the end, the grandma I had come to know and love my whole life long no longer existed. At some point in time in the recent past who she really was had disappeared from us; escaped from before our very eyes.

But intuition told me that something was missing from this picture. Grandma was more than her own memories.

Right?...

So I searched again. 

Could it be that we are the sum of what others say about us?

Well if that’s true, I told myself, then grandma’s identity was based on social reporting. However people would experience and eventually remember her would define who she was as a person. 

But for me, this picture was missing something, too. Grandma was more than what others have said or could ever say about her.

Right?...

So my mind went on another scavenger hunt again…

And then again and again and again. 

And every time I thought I had found a good starting point to ground my understanding of what it meant for my grandma to be grandma - for what it means for each of us to be human- I came up short.

Biology, sociology, psychology and all of the sciences seemed to leave something out of the picture. What makes us who we are?

The best I could really make sense of the human identity of my grandma was to look again through the lens of a biblical worldview. 

Could it be that Grandmas identity was given to her?

Could it be that she was made in the image of God? Could it be that, at the most foundational level, Grandma's identity was given to her?

If that was true... then maybe I could live well with her dying.

Because if she was made in God’s image, then she didn't earn her value in life and she wouldn't have to beg for dignity in death. 

Because if she was made in God’s image, then her identity wasn’t dependent others or subject to change with time or circumstances. 

Because if she was made in God’s image, who she was, the core of her identity, had nothing to do with whether or not she recognize herself or those whom she loved at the end of her life. 

And seeing the world this way, looking at my dear, sweet grandmother on her deathbed gave me a sense of thinking and being that granted my mind peace. 

Grandma was more than her disease, more than the list of her life’s accomplishments; more than her relationships and more than anyone could ever imagine or remember about her themselves. 

If my grandma was made in the image of God, then that is enough for me.

Questions For Reflection: How do you see the world?

• What does it mean to be human? How do we explain what makes us who we are?
• Do you think our identity as humans changes over time? If so, how do you think that happens? What are the implications if our identity does change?
• What about being human is better explained by other worldviews? Do they explain anything better than a biblical worldview does?
• What would you say in response to someone whose loved one is struggling with dementia? How might a biblical worldview shape your conversations with them?