Keep them talking!
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A year ago the word went out all over the world for carers of Alzheimer's patients to tell me, the author of Lost Words, what words their patients and loved ones had problems with. Masses of emails from every cor...
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old memory
N.C.
Thursday, October 30, 2008 at 10:47 AM
It is very good that you can help your Mom to refresh her old memory. In my father-in-law's case, I think he is getting less and less memory that we have to selectively remind him or refresh his memory or he gets too upset. For example, the patio is where he remembers more of the past. But the patio is opened only in the summer time when it is warm. So he goes there only in the summertime. This year, he got worse and the patio actually upset him much more. One time he went there being alone "reading" his local paper with real estate Ads/pctures of houses. After quite some time, say 30 minutes or more, he came back in and sat down on his sofa in the living room saying, I forgot everything! Who am I? Where am I? It is like this patio is the time tunnel and he got lost when he came back. So no more patio in the future. He cannot go there to eat supper either although he would like it later after supper. But why upset him anyway.
Some old pictures help but if they are too confusing to him, he gets upset as well. So we now choose the ones that are easier for him to remember, e.g., his late wife's pictures. If we show him something that is hard to remember, it makes him feel worse.
I think this has to do with the staging of Alzheimer's.
You are right, we should keep talking until they don't remember anything anymore.
Nina
It is very good that you can help your Mom to refresh her old memory. In my father-in-law's case, I think he is getting less and less memory that we have to selectively remind him or refresh his memory or he gets too upset. For example, the patio is where he remembers more of the past. But the patio is opened only in the summer time when it is warm. So he goes there only in the summertime. This year, he got worse and the patio actually upset him much more. One time he went there being alone "reading" his local paper with real estate Ads/pctures of houses. After quite some time, say 30 minutes or more, he came back in and sat down on his sofa in the living room saying, I forgot everything! Who am I? Where am I? It is like this patio is the time tunnel and he got lost when he came back. So no more patio in the future. He cannot go there to eat supper either although he would like it later after supper. But why upset him anyway.
Some old pictures help but if they are too confusing to him, he gets upset as well. So we now choose the ones that are easier for him to remember, e.g., his late wife's pictures. If we show him something that is hard to remember, it makes him feel worse.
I think this has to do with the staging of Alzheimer's.
You are right, we should keep talking until they don't remember anything anymore.
Nina