USA: Married Alzheimer's Patients Find New Loves in Nursing Homes

WASHINGTON, D.C. (NBC News), November 14, 2007: It's a heartache that the spouses of Alzheimer's patients never thought they'd know. A husband or wife, their memory and identity gone, falling in love with someone else. Tom Elgin watched as his parents wrestled with the same problem. Helen and Joe Elgin moved into the Huber Mercy Facility after she was diagnosed with Alzheimer's. "My dad's eight feet away, and she doesn't even know that he's there in the room," Tom recalls. But things worsened when Helen fell in love with another man at the facility. "Mom is looking for somebody else and Dad can't understand why this woman he's been married to for 72 years is chasing this other person." Joe Elgin has since passed away, Tom says without his mother ever understanding the heartache she caused. But consider the case of former Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor and her husband John. John was diagnosed with Alzheimer's and taken to Huber Mercy. Those first days there were a trying time. "He knew that this was the beginning of the end and he was on this campus and couldn't go anywhere else," says his son Scott O'Connor. "It was basically suicidal talk and he was very depressed." And that's when John took up with another woman at the facility. "48 hours after moving into that new cottage he was a teenager in love. He was happy." But his wife, who'd given up the a seat on the highest court in the land to care for John, wasn't jealous. "Mom was thrilled that Dad was relaxed and happy and comfortable living here and wasn't complaining." And Scott says it was even a relief for O'Connor, who'd had to deal with the guilt often associated with having a spouse at a care facility. "For Mom to visit when he's happy, visiting with his girlfriend, sitting on the porch swing holding hands. No stress on Mom, no guilt on Mom." Edited by Tommy Crouse, Producer © 2007 NBC News. All rights reserved