A Long Goodbye and Beyond

Book excerpt: Alzheimer's, the frightening disease of aging, is treated heroically in a touching book by a woman who left her important position as Assistant Secretary for Management at the U.S. Department of Treasury to care for her mother. After her mother's medical verdict of increasing memory loss was pronounced, Linda Combs resigned her executive post in Washington, D.C., and moved home to North Carolina.Her familiarity with Alzheimer's prompted Linda Combs to write her book, A Long Goodbye and Beyond, as a resource for other parental caregivers, like herself, who must assist a loved one to pass through the stages of unlovely deterioration.To this book of instruction, courage, kindness, sympathy and loyalty to the idea of a new life beyond, artist Tom Novak lends his marvelous illustrations, which are a tribute to brave souls who have the long loneliness of slow disintegration.