The Vow

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The Caretaker

Through the exhausting trials of Huntington's disease, a Northern Virginia couple finds meaning in their marriage.

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"I have to pee," she tells Dave, who has come to the doorway. In another corner of the family room is a hospital bed, and between the bed and the recliner is a portable standing toilet. She uses the bathroom there, rather than the downstairs half-bath. In 2007, an entry in Dave's journal said, "I have no more strength (patience) to get her to the bathroom."

Dave, who stands nearly 6 feet tall, fit from a life of hunting, fishing, canoeing and bicycling, has figured out a way to lift Diana safely. First, he puts one foot between her two feet to keep them both centered. Then he embraces her and hoists until she is standing. "Turn!" he says, and, "Face me" and, "Put your hands in my belt." With Dave walking backward, Diana follows him. Sometimes, he will get her to take a lap around the floor to give her exercise. Now he gets her settled on the toilet.

"You can sit there and tell me when you're done," he says. Sometimes she has the urge to urinate but her muscles cannot accomplish it right away, so he has learned to leave her on the seat.

He goes back into the kitchen and continues preparing their meal, singing to a CD of Tennessee Ernie Ford and chatting with a surprising amount of cheer. He's always tired, but today more than usual: Diana woke him last night, calling to him over the monitor by her bed. After he helped her to the toilet, she went back to sleep while he lay awake upstairs until the alarm rang at 5. He got up, fixed her medications, unloaded the dishwasher. Then he went to work and arrived home in time to help the aide give Diana a sponge bath.

Now he's pushing a rolling cart from the refrigerator to the kitchen island. The cart makes meal preparation more efficient. They're having honey-baked ham, a staple because it's easy and Diana likes it. He heats some canned potatoes, sprinkles salt and pepper on them, assembles a salad, gets out a loaf of bread he bought at Costco, and puts plates and utensils on the cart.

And now Diana is calling to him from the other room, saying she is done. "I've had a bowel movement, too," she says, which is good news, much better than the constipation sometimes caused by her medications. One Christmas, Diana suffered a bowel obstruction, an experience Dave never wants to live through again. He keeps a chart of all bowel movements now and increases her laxatives when necessary. He hoists Diana up, straightens her clothes, walks her, belly to belly, over to the recliner. "I told her this is the first time we've ever danced," he jokes. "Didn't I, Diana?"

"Yep," says Diana, who used to tell him he was chronically unromantic.

"Thanks," she says when she is sitting. She thanks him all the time, when he is helping her down the stairs, or bathing her, or putting on her pajamas.

"You're welcome," says Dave, adding, after a moment: "These are things I never thought I'd get thanked for. She's been more thankful about more things than I would have been. Sometimes I'll be curt with her, and she'll thank me. How bad is that on your conscience?"

"Ha!" cackles Diana.

"I shouldn't be telling you that," says Dave. "Now she'll always be thanking me."

Before long, she has the opportunity to return the joke. It takes him longer than usual to get dinner, and when he asks if she's ready, she suggests, "Why don't we wait a couple hours?"