Saturday, April 14, 2018

MY LIFE WITH DEMENTIA

I"ve written about Dementia before so this is an update, nothing much has changed, I am still the only caregiver of my husband, but now I take a mild drug for anxiety. I hate having to take something, but if I am to take care of my husband with love and compassion rather resentment that my old life is gone, my doctor and I decided it is best.

My husband is still the healthiest 96 1/2 year old you'll ever meet, I take him to ProWellness with is part of ProTherapy, if you have attended the latter, you pay less than if you had never been to therapy there. There is a trainer who works with him on various parts of his body. If I tell the trainer that my husband had trouble getting onto the sidewalk, he will work on that problem. Outside of exercise three or four times a week, I have him walk around the pool at least once a day, hot weather permitting.

Lately his appetite has reduced significantly, it could be the dementia or it could be that he gained a lot of weight and he is trying to slim down. He is taking the drug "Namenda" for his dementia, in addition to that several vitamins like B12, VirtVite which it the generic for Foltex, a multi vitamin, coconut capsule, all recommended by the neurologist who left town, now all we have is a neurologist that comes from Las Vegas every Friday, but mostly he sees the physician assistant or nurse practitioner. It is not a satisfactory arrangement, but it is all we have. There is NO CURE for dementia, the Namenda is supposed to slow it down and from dementia group I understand that it is only supposed to last two years, I can't tell. He was diagnosed with "vascular dementia", the arteries in his head are hardening, he has had two small strokes, before that several TIA's.

A friend and I recently attended a two day workshop held by the Dementia Connection of Lake Havasu City. The speaker or I think of her as the teacher was TEEPA SNOW. It was a refresher for me but there was a lot of new information. You can see/hear Teepa Snow on YouTube, she is simply fabulous. I had a private conversation with her and her advice to me was "do something fun for you." I haven't done that yet and don't know if I'll get around to it. My husband gets confused around strangers so I make sure that he is only surrounded by people he knows.

His old friend from the Golden K Kiwanis days pick him up for poker every Wednesday and it is surprising how often he wins. He is still good with numbers which is surprising. I am thankful to them for their kindness.

Life is not easy, but we muddle through it and I am grateful every day that he is still with me.

I hope some people will ready this, I'd appreciate a note to let me know this helped or enlightened you. I will be glad to answer any questions. Thank You for reading this.

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