I am so excited to share with you this story about caregiving, bread, and the importance of creativity. Special thanks to Ashley Look, who tolerated me throwing questions at her and also taught me about kindness, sacrifice, and bread-making over video chat.

In late 2016, I decided to start a blog exploring memory loss, caregiving, and food. But I had a lot of trouble. This is such a specific intersection and it makes a lot of sense to me, but not so much to most people. Except for, as I came to discover, a woman in Florida named Ashley Look. 

Back then, Ashley had been thrust into a caregiver role following her father’s diagnosis of Vascular Dementia and her mother’s diagnosis of Alzheimer’s. In July 2016, just as I was entering the world of speech language pathology and swallowing disorders, she posted a photograph of a delicious looking salad with a caption stating that her mother could no longer eat a salad like this “due to complications swallowing.” Ashley’s blog became a place for me to both explore this very specific food-caregiving-memory intersection and to push myself to understand the realities of being a caregiver for one’s family in America.

Embarrassingly, it took me four years to work up the courage to reach out to Ashley for an interview/baking session. At the time, I told myself I didn’t want to bother her while she was dealing with so much. But I’ve also always said I would like to host baking classes for caregivers because it can be such an isolating experience. So I’m not sure what I was thinking. Either way, I’m so glad I finally asked and thrilled she said yes.

I don’t want to go too much into her whole story because I would much rather you visit her blog and read her words. It’s so important for us as a society to interact with these firsthand experiences of caregiving and to acknowledge the realities of end-of-life care, aging, memories and memory loss. Something I find myself saying a lot lately (perhaps related to working in a nursing home during the pandemic) is that it is ok to be sad about sad things; that it’s normal to face sad things with sadness. There is this frustrating thing in our society where if something is sad, it is to be avoided at all costs. And what a waste of a learning opportunity, an experience to be human, and to connect. 

Now, let me explain more about how Ashley and I came to be standing in our respective kitchens baking bread together (virtually) over Zoom. 

About ten years ago, when she was around 32, Ashley Look made a resolution to learn to make bread for herself rather than buying it. It was a hobby she could focus on that was removed from everything else in her life. She found joy in it and sought to expand on it. Ashley went to visit a culinary school with the intention of doing nutrition therapy. But as it happened, while she was visiting, the nutrition classes weren’t in session and she became enamored with the little mason jars full of dried beans and grains in the kitchen associated with the culinary track. She enrolled the following year. 

Around the same time, Ashley visited her parents in Florida and began to observe something that scared her. She remembers sitting in the car with her mother and realizing that something was going on. Her mom had been the person in charge of everything. Any paperwork Ashey needed help with, for example, her mom knew what to do. She was an artist and a business woman — a florist. Her dad was brainy and very analytical, though he had been diagnosed with Vascular Dementia several years prior, when Ashley was 26. Ashley’s mom was the savvy one who navigated life and wrote the checks. She was also her husband’s primary caregiver. 

But there they were in the car on the highway, and Ashley’s mom was suddenly just staring at her own hands, entranced, distracted. And then, later on, she began overdrawing her bank account. The account had overdraft protection, so her mom would write a check and it would go through, but the bank would then charge her every time the account was overdrawn. Her mom was losing track of money earned and money spent. Even immediately following a visit to the bank to discuss the matter, Ashley’s mother drove to a wholesaler and wrote another check to purchase flowers. Her daughter didn’t know how to tell her she couldn’t do this. 

At the time, Ashley was living in Vermont. She was working as a chef, trying to help out and navigate an increasingly complicated situation from afar.  And she was also starting to feel incredibly anxious, constantly concerned about her parents who lived hours away in Florida. She was losing weight. She quite literally lost her voice. 

Ashley started to look into memory care. The numbers were staggering — $8,000 a month for one parent with memory loss. And she had two. “Where am I going to get that? Where are they going to get that?” She had to navigate the Medicaid and Medicare systems. There was no support system. When she sought support, she was offered pamphlets and reams of  papers to go through; another thing to do. She compared it to drowning and being told to throw yourself the ring, but you’re already in the water. Nothing to hold on to. 

And then, in 2015, Ashley got a call from Adult Protective Services informing her that if the situation wasn’t addressed, her parents would become wards of the state. Her mom had Alzheimer’s. She could no longer care for her husband or for herself. The decision was out of Ashley’s hands. She had to move home. She had to leave her job. And she had to create a fiscal plan. She wanted to start a business doing something with her mother involving crafting. Ever the artist, her mom could still create art, even if she later had no recollection of doing it. 

While we were chatting, Ashley pointed out a beautiful, full wreath on her wall that her mother made years ago. Ashley simply handed her the materials and, as if it were second nature, a wreath appeared from her mother’s hands. She didn’t remember making it, but there it was: a testament to her creativity and her capability.

Between these comforting moments, the reality of Alzheimer’s was ever-present. Balancing her desire to make her parents happy with the fact that her main role was to keep them safe, Ashley provided consistent attention, love, and care, always with the thought in her mind that she might not be doing enough. When her mother passed away suddenly, the idea for a crafting business (something that might bring Ashley herself joy and facilitate a connection with her mother) ended as well. For several years, she continued to take care of her father, but the plan for a side business was pushed aside because, she says, she “lost the vision” without her mother. 

Ashley was in her 30s, navigating Medicaid, Veteran benefits, medication, doctor’s appointments, and everything else involved in caregiving. And increasingly, she was aware of everything she was missing. 

“I spent so many years in this isolated environment with people who couldn’t really communicate and couldn’t go anywhere… What I really needed was for someone to start a conversation because my mind was turning into mush and I had no one to challenge my ideas.” 

Over the course of our conversation, Ashley and I talked about how important it is to have a hobby. Hobbies are a peaceful place to go, but they are also something that can stick with us when other parts fade away. For Ashley, baking bread is one of these things (although she is a woman of many talents as you can see on her website). For me, it’s making cakes. For Ashley’s mom, it was flowers. “We need to have an outlet in case our minds go,” Ashley said during our call. Her dad didn’t have a hobby like this. She told me he spent a lot of time looking at the television, upset about the interruption whenever an ad would come on. It’s not that our hobbies save us, but they are there for us. They are something to hold onto. 

And another thing that we all tend to hold onto is food. But this also changes when memory is going, when the ability to swallow becomes difficult, when senses of smell and sight diminish. Ashley’s mom used to struggle with this. “She couldn’t eat very much at all,” Ashley said. She had trouble swallowing. But she also didn’t always want the foods that were offered to her. Ashley discovered that she was picky about color. Asparagus was a no. But she would happily eat pureed soup with asparagus placed in a dainty tea cup because that was something special. She was lucky to have a daughter who took the time to truly provide dishes made with love. 

Ashley’s blog, “How to Feed a Senior” is something special. She writes about her journey feeding her parents, finding foods that are healthy but enjoyable; thoughtful and comforting. She shares her culinary knowledge and her experience with caregiving. And in her blog archives, you’ll find many stories about her father, Bob Look, who she affectionately refers to as Kool Bob. I remember a few years ago, she posted a picture of delicious looking pancakes with a caption that referenced her father losing interest in some of his old favorite foods. I stalked her Instagram to find the post. She had written, “A little bit of everything pancakes… By everything, I mean stuff to hide in pancakes so they are still pancakes and my dad will eat them. I have noticed a marked difference in his appetite. He seems to be losing weight and has lost interest in some of his old favorites. It’s worrisome but perhaps the natural course of dementia progression. I can’t say for sure but I made him these pancakes and he ate five of them!”

On December 19th, 2018, Ashley’s dad passed away. And everything changed again. But she is keeping up with her amazing blog, her bread-baking, and her other incredible hobby (though I think it’s quite a bit more than a hobby at this point) — spoon-carving. When she and I finally began a conversation about caregiving and food, she told me (and these are all her words from a message she sent me): “For a while after he passed, I was confused about the ‘senior’ I was still feeding and came to this realization that I’m now advocating for my own elderly life and what that could look like. I find a certain sense of beauty around it which isn’t portrayed much in senior care communities now. I’m hoping that can change as I age so when my time comes it’s a bit more welcoming. Like an honor to join elderhood!”

Recently, Ashley and her brother tried to refinance their parents’ house. But Ashley doesn’t have a solid-looking work history because she spent these years taking care of her parents. After her father died, she worked for six months on a boat (amazing story; please read all about it here) and then the pandemic hit. I mention this because it is important to build awareness around the repercussions of a system that does not support caregivers before, during, or after the caregiving experience. 

Also important: finding calm moments to do what you love, whether it’s a hobby, a random project, or time to just create. On our call, Ashley and I chatted and kneaded as she taught me how to make a simple bread. Then we signed off and both went on to make tea sandwiches with it. I always thought it was important to be extremely precise about bread-making. It turns out, like everything else, I was making it much more complicated than it needed to be. 

At the end of the day, Ashley’s bread was a gorgeous masterpiece. Mine was perfectly passable. And I am no bread expert. So that is a victory. 

ASHLEY’S BREAD

INGREDIENTS

• 3 c flour
• 1/12 tsp salt
• 1 ¼ c milk at room temperature
• 1 egg at room temperature
• 2 tsp active dry yeast

METHOD

1. Mix together the flour and salt in a large bowl
2. Mix together the milk, egg, and yeast in a separate bowl. 
3. Add the wet to the dry and mix with a wooden spoon.
4. Add more flour if you need to just until the dough kind of comes away from the bowl.

5. Plop the dough down onto a floured surface and knead and knead and knead. Add flour when it gets way too sticky to handle. Knead and knead.

6. Grease a bowl and roll the dough around in it. Cover the bowl and let it sit in a warm space for about an hour.

7. After an hour, take out your dough and plop it back out onto a floured surface. Knead again. 

8. Grease a loaf pan. Place your dough inside it. Roll to grease the dough. Cover and let it rise until doubled in size (about 1 and a half hours).

9. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F.
10. Bake for 35 minutes.
11. Brush with melted butter.

Huge thanks to Ashley Look for taking the time to share her story and her bread-baking skills. Again, PLEASE go check out her blog here and follow her on Instagram @howtofeedasenior.

And her simple bread recipe (minus the egg) can be found here.