by Senior Moments
If you are just starting to notice more “senior moments”, more forgetfulness, changes in behavior, attitude, more repetitive questions or stories in yourself or a loved one, it is probably time to have an assessment. (My father, of course, noticed these situations way before we did. But again, he didn’t mention it for a long period of time.)
Mom knew she was having memory issues, and that she repeated herself. When I would get frustrated, she would say something like, “I realize I repeat myself, but I am getting old. Be nice, just let me.” (Looking back, this was going on for several years.)
The Cover-up
Mom was embarrassed about her memory loss. She didn’t want to talk about it, and oh my, didn’t want anyone else to notice. However, within the first five minutes of meeting her, it was obvious that she had cognitive issues. People would notice and give me a concerned “look”. But, did our best to help her “cover-up” her dementia.)
Now if your loved one is like my mom, you may need to have a conversation with their doctor and ask them to do a “conversational diagnosis” as opposed to a straight-up, “We are going to test your cognitive abilities now”, sort of memory test. Mom would never submit to such a thing. Saying things like, “There is nothing wrong with my memory.” or “I don’t need a test for that”. Luckily, the social worker at mom’s doctor, at the time, was very good at camouflaging the test questions into a normal conversation with mom.
As time went on, it became more and more clear that there were deeper cognitive issues than just aging and the doctor gave her a memory patch, just like her older brother had. (In her mind since her brother had one, it was OK for her have one. So that helped for a few years.)
Tips That Help, and Work
As I mentioned above, the repetitive questions and stories were frustrating and I admit, I didn’t handle it the best. Recently, I found the video below. It has three very useful tips that work, which took me a long time to learn on my own. Oh, how I wish I had found this video back then, it would have saved me and mom much frustration. My hope by posting a link here is that many people find it, and it helps save them some frustration too. Click the following link to view the video “Three ways to better communicate with someone who has dementia“.
Please browse through my blog, hopefully you will find information that will help you on your dementia journey with your loved one(s).