Last Night In The Or By Bud Shaw: Chapter Analysis

Imagine a day where everything changes to something new. The daily routine is unrecognizable and suddenly everything becomes a blur. Remembering last christmas or even the day before seems impossible and all the information disappears. This represents the daily life of people with Alzheimer's disease. In the book, Last Night in the OR by Bud Shaw, the final chapter of the book is “Good Days and Bad.” The chapter starts with Bud Shaw and his father sitting at a kitchen table in a hospice care facility. Bud asks his father questions, but with his Alzheimer’s disease he can’t answer them. Connie the aide stands there with them providing care and she gives assistance as needed. She refers to him as Doc, because like Bud he use to be a transplant

The entire book composes the author’s personal experiences and accomplishments as a surgeon and the final chapter ties everything together. The author uses comparisons in every part of the chapter in order to convey his legacy precisely. The name of the chapter is a comparison to his father, he says the good and bad days vary interchangeably, and they “ (are) like that, bad days evolve to become the next good days”(Shaw 270). Comparing how his father’s days vary helps convey his legacy with his father, who is a huge part of it. Making clear connections to the present and past effectively displays the current situation of Bud's father. When he is with his father at Thanksgiving, his father fixes some of his pain simply with his hands. Bud said his father is “like a miracle”(Shaw 273)—he describes how his father can no longer remember what he did earlier in the day but can still make “miracles” with his hands. In addition, the author makes personal experiences by comparing them to the current reality. While his father eats cereal he makes a reference to how his father use to put barium on it. He compares his father and says he pretended to be “like a clown he did it to entertain other people”(Shaw 275), and he knew his father didn’t do it for any particular reason but did it in order to get attention. This all ties back to his legacy as a famous transplant surgeon who saved many lives. His father shapes him into the surgeon he ended up becoming, so ending the book with a chapter about his father brings everything together. Families with a family member diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease can make their life much more difficult. To illustrate, imagine seeing a family member barely recognize anyone or remember all the precious memories in their life. Bud's father was not only his father, but also his mentor and teacher. Losing his father changes Bud’s