CLEVELAND — It's in the quiet of her downtown Cleveland apartment where 72-year-old Molly McFadden finds her best ideas.
"It's sort of it's own sanctuary, and I'll start mapping out the framework," Molly said. "My career was a lot of theater, TV, films, soaps, commercials, industrials, regional theater, and cabaret. I did it all."
In New York with her husband Brian for 25 years, Molly found her happy place.
"Live performance. Live performance, a play, a run-through a give and take with the audience," she said.
By the 1990s, her career was taking off, then one night, several years ago, Molly's mom came to see her perform.
"I noticed a mood switch. She wasn't her effervescent self," Molly said. "And after everybody left, she just continued standing there on applauding, and it ... it sent chills down my spine. I was like, 'That's not my mom.'"
She was right. After returning home to Tennessee, Molly's mom was diagnosed with Alzheimer's.
"My agent in New York said, 'Don't stay down there. Get her housed and get right back.' My career was just clipping along. And I said, 'That's not gonna happen. I have to spend time in this transition,'" Molly explained.
While caring for her mom, Molly yearned for an outlet to process her feelings.
"I went, 'You know what? I'm gonna recreate that night that my mom came.' And the journey began, it just came to me," Molly said.
What came to her, was a play called Living on the Moon, featuring Memory, a puppet she modeled on her one of a kind mom.
At the Maltz Performing Arts Center, the duo take the audience on a personal journey of Alzheimer's.
"So, through humor, we relive some of the macabre journey we were on and through discovery. And she sings with me. We get to the end of it, and I'm able to finally say, 'It wasn't my fault,' and I can let her go," Molly explained.
"Any illness, I think you go through with people you love, you do carry that, that sense of somehow you couldn't save them," Molly said. "I was amazed at how it universally just spoke to people."
Little did she know, how much it would end up speaking to her.
"Because I do research at Cleveland Clinic just to help with the discovery of Alzheimer's, I found out I had the gene," Molly explained. "And they did tests. And they said, 'You could be on the early side of Alzheimer's.' I was devastated. 'Cause I didn't want to end up like my mom."
Molly got to work, enrolling in Dr. Sandra Darling's Brain Health and Wellness program through the Cleveland Clinic a few years ago.
"I learned about the diet. I learned about no sugar. I learned so much," Molly said.
"This is a lifestyle program designed to improve patients with mild to moderate memory loss," Dr. Darling said. "That's the one thing that I absolutely do for my patients, is I let them know that, look, there is something that can be done."
"So my life got better. I got healthier. I felt better than I ever had," Molly said.
A resolve strengthened by her love for Mom.
"My mom once said, 'Honey, you were born under a lucky star.' And I said, 'I think I was.' And I miss her," Molly said through tears.
Now, she'll continue this fight ... for Mom, herself, and all other lives touched by memory loss.
"I want other people to have hope because what I've experienced with Alzheimer's and people who go through it, they wait until it's too late. They succumb to it. And they don't have to," Molly said.
For more information on the Cleveland Clinic Brain Health and Wellness program, click HERE.
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