The Seed, Part One – My Father

A late-night call, a moment of confusion, and the idea that could save lives.

It was the middle of the night when my phone rang. The alarm company was calling—my parents’ front door was open, the code was entered wrong several times, and no one was answering.

I made it there in record time. The house was dark, the alarm was blaring off and on, and the front door was ajar. As I stepped inside, I saw light flickering down the hallway. In my parents’ bedroom, my father was rifling through the nightstand with a flashlight. My mother was in bed with the covers pulled over her head.

“Daddy, what are you doing?” I asked.“I’m looking for the code to the alarm,” he replied.

I quickly disarmed the system from the bedroom keypad—just in time to hear police radios and see officers approaching the front door with hands on their weapons. The house was still dark. They couldn’t see me. And I couldn’t stop thinking about what they would have seen if they’d arrived first: my confused father, in the dark, holding a flashlight, standing near an open drawer with a pistol inside.

That night shook me. It opened my eyes to how invisible dementia can be, and how easily symptoms can be mistaken for criminal behavior—especially in early stages, when a person still looks healthy and capable. If there had been some way to silently signal “this person is living with dementia” before that encounter, the danger could have been reduced instantly.

That was the seed for Dementia Guardian—a universal, easy-to-recognize symbol to alert others that a person is living with dementia, so they can respond with patience and compassion. The second seed came later, with my mother’s journey through Alzheimer’s disease—a story I’ll share in Part Two.