We asked Mom to move in with us because we were concerned about her health. At times, she had been showing signs of dementia, but we didn’t know if she had Alzheimer’s or if her problems were caused by other underlying medical or mental problems.
After Mom moved to her new apartment, I tried to check in on her more often. At times, she seemed like she was in a cloud or daze. She had trouble understanding and remembering things that I would tell her. I kept asking her about her medical care. Had she been to the doctor lately? Was she taking all of her medicine? Maybe her doctor needed to see if some of the medicine was having an effect on her thinking? Even though she said her doctor said she did not have Alzheimer’s, we still wondered and thought she did show some signs of dementia.
After awhile, we started to wonder if things weren’t going as well as Mom wanted us to believe. It’s hard to pinpoint when we started to be concerned. Since Mom had always had a negative and paranoid outlook, I thought a lot of her behaviors and thoughts were just her. Her suspicions of others started getting more serious. She told me she thought the maintenance men were coming into her apartment and stealing things (things like silverware or her computer manuals she couldn’t find), I tried to reason with her, but she would get angry. She would always read more into other people’s behavior to believe they were out to get her.
This post is about what could have been the very early signs and when we started to be concerned. After Mom moved to her apartment, my husband and I were focused on starting our family. We had our son and daughter 15 months apart, and we were busy with raising them and taking care of our house. Mom lived about an hour away, but I talked with her on a regular basis. Whenever we needed a sitter, we left the kids with Mom. For the most part, Mom seemed happy and in good health.
From what I’ve learned about Alzheimer’s disease, it affects everyone a little differently. Everyone’s story is unique, yet there may be certain aspects that others can relate to. I’m going to share a series of posts that explains Mom’s story with Alzheimer’s so far.
To understand my Mom who suffers from early to moderate Alzheimer’s today, you have to know who she was before she had Alzheimer’s. Even though Alzheimer’s and the dementia that accompanies it often changes behavior, I see a lot of familiar behaviors in Mom that come out when she misinterprets or imagines an event that upsets her.
Welcome to my new blog which is dedicated to caregivers of loved ones suffering from Alzheimer’s disease. My mom was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease about a year ago. She is in the early to moderate stage of the disease, and lives with me, my husband, and our two children.
On December 31, 2008 I started a [...]