Yes, Nords, there is a time when people are happy.
I remember my grandmother. She moved to a facility, and worriedly asked people if she was going downhill like her mother had. They all blithely lied to her, and told her it was all OK. She didn't seem to be happy. Then she became more confused and believed my Uncle (her son) was her husband, and my aunt was "the other woman". Then came the terrible day when my Uncle didn't visit her (he visited her every day, but it was his father-in-law's funeral, so he couldn't that day). She got out of the facility, and tried to get run over by the traffic in the very busy road next to the facility. She was going to make him sorry.
She moved somewhere more secure and with less traffic. She couldn't remember things, and she was happy. For a time. Yes, she was happy - I'd forgotten that period. She was like your father.
But that time was when she could still move around, talk, do things. She forgot that she had just eaten, and what you ate, and ate the flowers people brought. She stopped being able to get up. For years she just lay there. No words. My uncle still visited her every day. And then, 8 years after she had obviously been happy, she eventually died. It wasn't that long ago - she was 98.
My parents are not happy. They are in their 80s. They don't have dementia, but they feel as if they are just hanging around until they fall off the perch. My mother has achieved a great deal in her life - but that is not enough. I ring them up each night, and get them both laughing. The pain of arthritis, heart problems, just simply moving around... is continually pulling them down. Dad has cancer, and had an operation last year where the doctor left him with a cut artery. He pressed the button for help, and had emergency surgery at midnight to put it right. He now says he shouldn't have pressed the button.
Which is the better way to get old?