“Where Has Our Mother Gone”

My mother had fell out of bed. My parents sleep in their basement where there is a concrete floor. My Sister and Father took her to the ER where they did a CT scan and said that she was fine. A month or so later and they took her in for another CT scan and said that they saw a place on her brain where there was dried blood.

In this blog I am going to share as best I can my family’s experience with dementia.

So many people know so little of this horrible disease.

I have training in dementia and work in a field where persons have dementia, and it wasn’t until it affected our family that I realized that I knew less than I thought.

I was ill when my family was trying to care for my mother themselves and what they endured was so horrible and sad.

There are 100 forms of dementia according to Alzheimers International. 60-80% are the most common form which is Alzheimers. Lewy Body is the worst form of dementia and most aggressive and TBI Traumatic Brain Injury can be linked to the development of both Parkinsons and Lewy Body which my mother was diagnosed with both.

50 million people all over the world have dementia. Sadly, it is predicted that by 2050 that number will drastically increase to 140 million.

If caught in the very early stages, there are many meds that may help slow the progression but there is no known cure as dementia is also age related,

Unfortunately, my family, in an attempt to care for my mother themselves, didn’t get her placed in a memory care facility until she was at stage 6. In hindsight we realized that my mother had experienced on set dementia after her fall.

There are 7 stages of dementia, the 1st is mild onset and un-noticeable to the person affected or family and friends.

The 2nd stage will be very mild cognitive decline or memory loss linked to aging or pre-dementia.

3rd stage would include occasional signs of memory loss such as slight anxiety, difficulty focusing, forgetting names of family members, misplacing important things, it is best that the person experiencing such things go to their doctor to be diagnosed.

In the 4th stage they will experience all of the symptoms of stage 3 that will now include that they may appear withdrawn socially, they may appear to be in denial as a self-defense mechanism, they may become disoriented and have problems completing daily tasks, they may forget recent events, they may appear to withdrawal from family and friends, will interfere with daily life, unable to find the right words when speaking.

Stage 5 is considered to be mid stage dementia. They may still recognize loved ones, they may have problems making decisions when it comes to their healthcare, at this stage you may want to seek assistance in your home to assist in their care. They may experience mood swings and a change from their normal personality, they may forget things like the date, oh man, I‘m in trouble as I forget the date often, lol. They may need help going to the bathroom, bladder control issues, have trouble with daily activities such as choosing clothes.

Stage 6 considered severe dementia, will show strong changes in their personality, mood swings, have delusions, as an example they may think they have to go to work when they have no job. they may get lost as they may wander off, insomnia, an inability to control their bladder, difficulty toileting by themselves, getting dressed, their eating habits may change, have difficulty with speech.

And last, the Final Stage or Last Stage dementia, they will forget loved ones and friends, inability to speak, eat or swallow, inability to speak, eat, swallow, toilet themselves, lose ability to walk or sit without assistance, loss of all bladder and bowel control. They also may experience the following symptoms, confined to a bed or wheelchair, for the most part will be disoriented, will not be able to recognize family members.

Because my mother’s Lewy body dementia is more severe, she often hallucinated, thought people or things were present that weren’t. According to the website www,nia,nih,gov Persons with LBD may suffer from hallucinations.

My mother suffered horrible paranoia and hallucinations. According to my Sis who lives with my mother and father my mother would see people in their house, see children, all that weren’t there. She was outside once and when my Sis asked her why she was outside she told her to make the people in the house leave. There were times my father had problems getting her to go to bed, it broke my heart, as I’m sure it did my father’s, when she would ask him if they were married.

My father and niece and Sis tried everything to care for my mother, my Sis and father would lose sleep as they would have to stay up with my mother, as she often didn’t sleep as they would try to keep her from leaving the house. One night they both were sleeping when they heard a knock on the door, it was a police officer, letting them know my mother went to the neighbors at 11 p.m. at night, knocked on their door, with a cane and a can of bug spray in hand told them my father was possessed and that aliens were coming. The breaking point was when my mother chased them out of the house and when they got back into the house, she attempted to assault them with a flashlight. It was then that she was taken to a hospital and diagnosed, and as I said earlier, she was already at stage 6. I remember after that my Sis had to take her to a doctor appointment, my Sis called me in tears as my mother refused to get out of the car and she said horrible things to my Sis. At this point it was common for my mother to bring my niece and Sis to tears as she would say horrible, mean things to them. Still my niece and Sis and father did not want to place mother in a facility so they took her to a small apartment behind our church and said they would take turns watching her. She refused to bathe and when she did, she would fight anyone assisting her, we were later informed that persons with dementia do not like bathing as they feel as though they may drown. She would often not know my father, sister or niece, be agitated, wander out of the apartment, at one point she stood in the middle of the apartment living room floor and peed and when my father asked her what she was doing she replied with, “What did you want me to do pee on your face”?, hilarious as this was, my father finally let go and realized that she had to be placed somewhere.

My mother, once shy and timid, tiny and never would attack another person now says very off the wall, out of character things and sometimes physically attacks people. We laugh at some of things she does and says, but as my sister and I say that these things are funny yet not funny. It is common for a person with dementia to behave totally opposite of how they normally would as I described of my mother.

This horrible disease that is caused by brain cell damage that thins the cortex of the brain and thins the brain as a whole and causes it to shrink, then robbing her of her memories, with some coming through very seldom, robbing of us our mother, my father of his wife and as I believe she is in stage 7, having to know that it will only get worse. As we all say my mother is not suffering except for the occasional times when she says things like she feels like she’s stuck between two worlds, she’s so tired or she just wants Jesus to come to get her, the two latter equally painful to hear. We, her family are the ones that are suffering and she as well when she experiences the various health side effects that can come with dementia. She has experienced many health issues as of lately such as jaundice, extreme water retention and now possibly shingles.

With this disease we have had to go through the pain of losing our loved one as they have no memory of us and as it progresses, she is losing all interest in us as there are times, we go to visit her, and she has no interest in us at all and simply goes about what she is doing as though we aren’t there. This has been especially hard on my father who has experienced denial that her condition is as bad as it is, to anger that he has been robbed of finishing out his life with the woman he has been with for over 60 years, to crying from the pain of it all, to knowing we will one day get a phone call telling us she has either passed or is passing. Then will be our 2nd and more painful loss as she will be gone.

I know this has been one of my longest blogs but often times you will hear someone discussing their loved one with frustration as they are accusing family members of stealing from them or acting paranoid and I shared our story as I want to educate people about this disease so that if they encounter it personally they will have an idea of what they are dealing with and realize their loved one can’t help it.

As always for more discussion on this or any of my blogs contact me at ingali4@aol.com

Mention which blog, no haters please!

Practice random acts of kindness

Resources; Alzheimers International, welks.com,2zhealthy.com,neurologyadvisor.com

WELCOME TO MY BLOG

WELCOME TO MY BLOG

WELCOME TO MY BLOG