Katie Wood has been bringing her four children to Cornfield Point in Old Saybrook, Connecticut, to spend the summer for nearly a decade. She never expected a single trip to the ocean this year would change her entire perspective on parenting.

The Boston-based mom of four said she has watched the same woman walk up and down the beach every year.

"Her name is Donna and she has Alzheimer's," Wood, 40, told me.

"I have met her before, but she doesn’t remember any of us. The community keeps an eye on her. She’s a total sweetheart."

Wood was watching her children play by the water earlier this month when Donna approached.

"She came up to me and said, 'Will you take me into the water?'" Wood said, adding that her initial reaction was that she didn't want to get wet. "But everything in me was like...read more