This article was written by Matt Flegenheimer of The New York Times. It has been re-published in numerous newspapers across the country. It is a modern-day tragedy that deals with the unimaginable strife that families deal with when a family member is afflicted with Alzheimer’s Disease.

“His was a love story, Charles D. Snelling wrote — a tale of a shiftless dreamer and the woman who saved him, of the life they built over six decades and the disease that stood no chance of erasing it. By the end, he said, their time together had become a case study in reciprocity.

“‘She took care of me in every possible way she could for 55 years,’ Snelling wrote of his wife, Adrienne, months before the two were to celebrate their 61st wedding anniversary. ‘The last six years have been my turn, and certainly I have had the best of the bargain.’

“On Thursday, months after contributing a poignant essay to The New York Times about navigating a six-decade marriage upended by his spouse’s Alzheimer’s disease, Snelling killed his wife and himself, the Snelling family said in a statement released to The Morning Call of Allentown. They were found Thursday in their home in Lehigh County in eastern Pennsylvania, the police said. Charles Snelling shot himself, the coroner said. The ruling on Adrienne Snelling’s death was pending. Both were 81.

“In the statement, the Snelling family said Charles Snelling had acted ‘out of deep devotion and profound love.’

“In December, in response to an Op-Ed column by David Brooks, Snelling contributed a 5,000-word ‘Life Report’ essay to nytimes.com, devoting the final section to his wife’s disease and his role in managing it.

““It’s not noble, it’s not sacrificial and it’s not painful,’ he wrote of his caretaking duties. ‘It’s just right in the scheme of things. After all, this lady rescued me from a fate worse than death, and for a long, long time.’

“Snelling met the woman who would become his wife at a sophomore dance at Cedar Crest College in Allentown. She was spoken for then, “on the arm of the Yalie” who was her date, Snelling wrote. It would not last.

“‘That Adrienne was the girl that I wanted, the girl that I needed to bring into my life, and the girl that I had to marry became very clear to me quite soon,’ Snelling wrote.

“But it soon became apparent that Adrienne Angeletti was studious, he continued, and so he would have to be, too. When she took her books and a blanket outside to study, Snelling tagged along ‘to pester her,’ he wrote.

“‘You’re not studying,’ she would say, according to Snelling, to which he would reply, ‘I’m studying you.’

“On March 21, 1951, the two were married. Read the rest of this entry »