Still Jan, just a limited edition

My sister Jan Jefferson has been diagnosed with Frontotemporal Dementia (her preliminary diagnosis had been early-onset Alzheimer’s). She now lives in a memory care facility in the Madison area because she is no longer able to live by herself.

Unlike the protagonist of the book and movie, “Still Alice”, Jan was never a Harvard professor. Her story is much more blue collar, but equally compelling and equally tragic.

Many Madisonians will remember her as a 25-year Madison firefighter and paramedic. She saved lives, and comforted those she couldn’t save, in their last moments of life. She was part of that first group of women who broke the gender barrier to join the city’s Fire Department.

Prior to that, she earned a degree in early-childhood education from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and taught at a local daycare. Later she worked at the General Motors auto assembly plant in Janesville, and played rugby with the UW-Madison club team.

But I mostly remember her as my cool older sister. The one who took the time to try to teach her nerdy brother to dance in grade school, so that he might be just a little bit cool, or at least less nerdy.

She was a highschool cheerleader - what athletic young women did in the pre-Title Nine days. But her passion was softball. She played on a summer 4-H coed team, and was a better player than most of the boys, including me.

When I joined the Peace Corps, after college, she wrote me letters regularly. This was in the pre-internet, pre-wireless days, and the towns where I was stationed had no phone service. She even visited me in El Salvador, and we spent a month traveling, and enjoying each other’s company.

I have so many great memories of Jan! How many memories of her incredibly active and useful life does she retain? It is impossible to know. She can still recite the lyrics to some old songs. She still loves little children, and animals, and visits from her old firefighter buddies and family.

But the bulk of the remembering, we have to do for her, because her dementia has robbed her of those memories. I’m sad for her and for all of us who know her. Too much of Jan has been taken from us way too soon!