We got to know Thomas and Lynn Shaw in our last newsletter, where they opened up about Lynn’s young-onset Alzheimer’s diagnosis. They’re allowing us to chronicle their journey – peaks, pits and all – to see what a year in the life of this disease can really look like.
Lynn, originally from the Philippines, is one of 16 children and is the only one who moved away. She and Thomas’s sister, Kitty, had been planning a trip back to her home country for years, and they were determined not to let the diagnosis stop their girls’ trip.
Lynn poses with a woman who greeted guests at their hotel on Mactan Island.
“I was a bit nervous, but Tom and I couldn’t have been more prepared,” Kitty said.
That preparation included Kitty attending a caregiver support group leading up to the trip, taking along a stack of Companion Cards from Alzheimer’s San Diego to alert flight and hotel staff she was traveling with someone with dementia and even kicking Thomas out of the master suite at home for a few days so Lynn could get used to sleeping in the same room as Kitty.
Lynn and Kitty both said they had a fantastic trip. While there was a brief scare when they got separated at a hotel when an elevator door slammed shut, the staff (remembering the Companion Cards) stayed by Lynn’s side until they found each other a few minutes later.
Thomas said he knows there’s no one-size-fits-all policy when it comes to traveling such a long distance with a person with dementia, but for them, the key was preparation and flexibility.
“We figured out a lot of things by accident, just by Kitty coming out here in advance and spending time with Lynn,” he said. “And, as always, we live life day by day.”
