Melvyn Amrine finds it difficult to remember everything since his Alzheimer’s diagnosis but the important details stand out.
Diagnosed with Alzheimer’s three years ago, Melvyn can’t always remember and life can be difficult for Doris, his wife of 60 years.
This year, Melvyn from Little Rock, Arkansas, went missing the day before Mother’s Day. He usually requires assistance to get out and about and this out of character disappearance caused his family to call the police.
When the authorities found him, he was two miles from his home. Melvyn told the police that he was going to buy flowers for his wife for Mother’s Day, as he had done this every year since they had their first child.
Sgt. Brian Grigsby and Officer Troy Dillard were touched by the encounter and brought Melvyn to buy the flowers and insisted on paying for them.
“We had to get those flowers,” Grigsby told CBS News. “We had to get them. I didn’t have a choice.”
“When I saw him walking up with those flowers in hand, it just about broke my heart because I thought ‘Oh he went there to get me flowers because he loves me,” Doris said.
She added: “It’s special, because even though the mind doesn’t remember everything, the heart remembers”.
