November is National Alzheimer's Awareness Month. For the past year and a half I have volunteered at the Alzheimer's Association, in addition to spending a considerable amount of time studying and researching the causes and effects of the disease as well as the needs of caregivers. We recently had two Memory Walks of over three hundred participants each for our local chapter of the Alzheimer's Association, their annual fund and awareness raising events.
After helping set up canopies, tables, chairs, etc.,I grabbed a water and initiated a conversation with a gentleman named Doug, who was getting a water for his 3 year-old granddaughter, Kristy. I asked Doug what brought him to the Memory Walk event. He replied," we're here to support our dear friend, Jen. Her husband Lee has Alzheimer's, he was a good friend." I said" You know Doug, Lee still is a good friend of yours, he just can't express it the same way because of his disease. Visit him when you get a chance and take Kristy with you. I bet he's love to watch her play." Doug replied, " You're right. I'll absolutely do that."
For all of our dementia family and friend loved ones, please remember we all need to help them maintain their personhood as long as possible. They all love human companionship, in whatever form we can give it to them. I'll expand on this concept in future blogs.
Don, You might be interested to know that in the October issue of Men's Health magazine, there is an article titled "Can You Catch Alzheimer's?". In this article are studies that claim Alzheimer's is caused by a Herpes virus. You can read the article here - http://www.menshealth.com/cda/article.do?site=MensHealth&channel=health&category=other.diseases.ailments&conitem=e57a735bffb83210VgnVCM10000030281eac____&page=1
Posted by: Robert Dianella | 11/18/2009 at 02:11 PM
Bob, Thanks for bringing this interesting article to my attention. There is so much extensive research going on now to determine the cause of Alzheimer's, hopefully this is one avenue that will lead to us understanding how to stop or slow down the amyloid plaques and neurofibrillary tangles, that appear in Alzheimer's patients.
Posted by: Don McNeil | 11/19/2009 at 08:20 AM