Dealing with Dementia: Part 3

Its never just the memory loss now is it? It is sad, frustrating yet inevitable that the diseases which we know that lead to dementia affect a lot of other neurological functionality as well.

The brain happens to be a highly sophisticated organ with intricate nerve connections and complex networks. Despite that, a dead or destroyed nerve cell cannot regenerate. In short, what is lost is almost always pretty much lost.

This destruction to a nerve cell can be due to multiple reasons. Like for e.g. Alzheimer's disease or Parkinson's disease can do this. A blow to the head can do this. A severe brain infection could do this.

Another thing that we need to understand is progression of disease. Let's take some very common examples to understand this.

If someone has a Stroke ( aka- brain clot. Brain bleed, brain attack) then that part of the brain affected is now damaged. As the person recovers, the remaining areas of the brain slowly and very gradually tend to take over the role of the damaged area. This does not always happen but this can happen.

But in a disease like Alzheimer's or Parkinson's, the disease progresses. This means that some parts of the brain are initially damaged and slowly other parts also get damaged. So what begins as memory loss can then progress to weakness, loss of sensation, imbalance and so on and so forth.

That's the science.

That's not always easy to accept when the person affected means the world to you.

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Dad stopped walking after some time. He then couldn't get up. Then he could move his legs. That made things worse. We were temporarily paralyzed with our decision making too.

We figured we needed someone dedicated to take care of dad. With me going to work and mom being not really young, meant that too much of burden on us would eventually break us. Mentally and physically.

We were lucky enough to find someone. Its not easy. And obviously you have to now pay someone's salary. Which being an added expense, meant we had to cut down things that we didn't really need.

We stopped unnecessary shopping for clothes and accessories. Apparently, you can still survive without getting a whole bunch of clothes for festivals.

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A little bit of medicine before I wind up.

Sometimes, people tend to have very rigid hands and legs or very painful limbs along with Dementia.

This is extremely troublesome for them and makes it hard to clean then without causing discomfort.

There are medicines available to help someone with this, which are not expensive and are necessary. One must consider using them rather than putting someone through discomfort just because you don't believe in something you have no idea about.

We went back to Dad's neurologist and started him on a few meds to help ease his developing symptoms. We could see how much easier it was for him in the days to come

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1. Seek help. Caregiving for a sick person isn't easy.

2. Manage your finances to support the person in need.

3. Revisit your doctor if there are new symptoms. Google does not have all the right answers.