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How does sharing diagnosis of Alzheimer's affect patient?
Caregivers: Dementia | Last Active: Oct 9 10:08pm | Replies (31)Comment receiving replies
@ret2tus, I wanted to address your question about how and when to tell others, when your husband can't or doesn't.
You might find the tips shared by Mayo Clinic experts helpful:
- Maintaining Friendships https://connect.mayoclinic.org/blog/living-with-mild-cognitive-impairment-mci/newsfeed-post/maintaining-friendships/
- Should I Tell My Family About My MCI? https://connect.mayoclinic.org/blog/living-with-mild-cognitive-impairment-mci/newsfeed-post/should-i-tell-my-family-about-my-mci/
- Who Else Besides Family Should I Tell About My MCI? https://connect.mayoclinic.org/blog/living-with-mild-cognitive-impairment-mci/newsfeed-post/who-else-besides-family-should-i-tell-about-my-mci/
- Discussing MCI with children https://connect.mayoclinic.org/blog/living-with-mild-cognitive-impairment-mci/newsfeed-post/discussing-mci-with-children/
Obviously, you have good communication and shared understanding of who you agreed to tell, but what about the people who haven't been told and symptoms are becoming apparent. That gets stickier, right. You want to respect his control to share when he wants and is ready, but I'm sure you also see that some situations may be eased if the other person had some insight. Am I getting that right?
Replies to "@ret2tus, I wanted to address your question about how and when to tell others, when your..."
The sad part of all of these comments is that it seems that so many people treat this disease like something we should not talk about when it is not talked about enough. So many people have a form of dementia or will get it, we should be talking about it more. How to treat it, cope with it, understand it. Not ostracize those who have it. My husband has multifactorial dementia and Alzheimer's, as a retired career nurse nothing prepared me for this, he denies there is anything "wrong" with him every day. He ran multi-billion dollar projects for a major utility company 8 years ago and now can't operate the TV remote or find the cheese in the fridge. We need to educate, support caregivers, reduce stress, find the cause and improve care and treatments!
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Thank you, Colleen. You're exactly right. Thank you for the links to the blogs. I may share the one about telling family and close friends with him.