Alzheimer's Caregivers

I recently received my copy of Alzheimer's Caregivers . This free handbook and tip sheet is well worth obtaining. You can get up to three free copies so its also easy to share. Get your free copy.



If you obtain the handbook, please let me know your reaction. Feel free to email this post to your friends and relatives.



The 36-Hour Day: A Family Guide to Caring for People with Alzheimer Disease and Memory Loss in Later Life

My mother at the age of 85 was a real dynamo

She lived on her own, paid her own bills, and took care of herself.......

My mother at the age of 85 was a dynamo. She lived on her own, paid her own bills, and took care of herself. She had been doing this for more than ten years since the death of my father. She was on her own.

My mother was often spotted walking to the pool in her community. A tiny women the senior citizens all around her marveled. It seemed as if father time had forgotten about her. There was no limit to what she could do. Walk 20 blocks, no problem, you name it. Up at dawn and awake at midnight she was a real dynamo.

My mother was very funny, a real character. She made people laugh and smile. She read the newspaper daily, did the crossword puzzle and watched CNN. She had opinions on everything and wanted to know your opinion. She was a wonderful person: always welcoming people into her home. She was noted for all of my 50 years for her great Italian cooking. I remember as a kid that all of my friends really looked forward to staying over our house. Donuts, spaghetti and meatballs you name it. Ravioli anyone? My mother was and is a real character.

Me? I was there with my mother when my fathered "passed away'; this was when I really started thinking about her longevity, her health. I was thinking about her for years knowing that someday she had to live with one of us (I have a brother and sister). As the years flew by I started to think about it more and more. She just kept going ang going without a health problem of any kind. Rarely a minor illness. But, I knew in my mind that sooner or later father time was going to catch up with her.

At times, my brother, sister and I had discussions about putting my mother into some kind of "facility". To be honest, to be honest now, I knew I would never be able to do it. While I had only mentioned it to a few people, I had made a promise to my father not long before he died. I promised him no matter what, I would take care of his wife of 55 years, my mother, our love, Dorothy. It was not a promise I made haphazardly. It seemed as natural to me as breathing. I already knew in my mind and my heart, I was the one.

I knew the day would come. I just didn't know when. Or how.

The 36-Hour Day: A Family Guide to Caring for People with Alzheimer Disease and Memory Loss in Later Life

What If It's Not Alzheimer's: A Caregiver's Guide to Dementia

The Beginning of Good-bye

This blog reveals the personal travails of an Alzheimer's caregiver and her mother. If you go back in time and read the posts you will be moved by the heartfelt writing. So real, so personal.

For those of us walking down the same path, the writing on this blog is both educational and heart wrenching. For me it has done two important things, it has let me know what I am facing and that I am not alone.

This writing has often brought tears to my eyes but never more then at this moment.

clipped from yellowwallpaper.net I am slowly allowing myself to realize that this will be my mother’s last infirmity. I kept playing devil’s advocate with myself as she’s failed over the past couple of weeks–how on earth could she fail so quickly?–but this is one of the ways it happens. It boils down, I think, to an injury of her spirit. Something within her is saying, “It’s time to go.” As if on cue, a bed opened up in the skilled nursing unit at Garden Manor, and she’ll be moving back there soon. Her doctor mentioned something about a feeding tube and I said NO NO NO. She’s 86 years old (yesterday was her birthday) and the past few years have been difficult for her. I will have Hospice attend to her. Right now she is halfway there, I think–she sleeps a lot and mumbles about her teaching days. She doesn’t seem to be in any great pain or distress (unless someone lifts her the wrong way). I don’t want any more CT scans or x-rays or stretchers. She will go gently.

Big belly in middle age triples risk of dementia

My mother has visceral fat. At her age it could be life threatening. There is no doubt this is a contributing factor to her Alzheimer's. She is exercising but at the age of 91, and after many years of bad eating habits, it is very difficult to get her to lose weight.

clipped from www.breitbart.com Having a large belly in middle age nearly triples the risk of developing dementia, a study released Wednesday found Researchers measured the abdominal fat of 6,583 people age 40 to 45 in northern California and some 36 years later 16 percent had developed dementia, the study published in the journal Neurology found. Those who were overweight or obese but did not have a pot belly had an 80 percent increase in the risk of dementia compared to people with a normal body weight and abdominal fat level. The risk increase jumped to 230 percent among overweight people with a large belly and 360 percent among the obese with large abdomens. "Where one carries the weight -- especially in midlife -- appears to be an important predictor for dementia risk," Whitmer said. "These findings imply that the dangerous effects of abdominal obesity on the brain may start long before the signs of dementia appear."