my historian brother sent me a newspaper article that a distant cousin had sent him from an out of state newspaper
its a sad story
this distant cousin said this person in the article was a more distant cousin
i recently made a family tree of dementia and posted it
this cousin came of a branch of my dads sister that i dont ever recall seeing so i dont know if my aunt had dementia like her brother and her sister and her mother had
ie
my dad my aunt and my paternal grandmother
but
dementia is riddled all through out our family tree
this 86 year old women was found standing over her husband with a broken bloody cane
she had beat him to death
she was confused and didnt make sense when the neighbor who called the police and the police talked to her
they said she was obviously had mental difficulties
no
she had dementia and being my distant relative probably has alzheimers disease
she was handcuffed and shuffled to jail and is charged with murder
usually when you see someone killed and its alzheimers related the person has turned a gun on themselves and committed suicide
or
a loved one has taken mercy on them and shot them or overdosed them or like a story i read about in the paper last week a husband smothered his wife with a pillow
is this lady guilty
what should happen to her
are the spouses guilty of murder
what should happen to them
just take a minute and think about what society should do
i remember worrying about my younger brother who had alzheimers disease having access to his guns he used in his job as a deputy sheriff and guns he used to sport hunt
the family removed them from the home
usually when someone has alzheimers disease they cant figure out how to commit suicide since the disease has advanced too far like in the movie still alice when she couldnt find her pills she had saved to overdose on
but
as someone who thinks of what it will be like in the future for me it does enter your mind sometimes
at what point does it happen
it seems to be uncommon that a dementia patient commits suicide though
since
you want to extract the most out of your cognitive lights as long as you can so you can enjoy them before the cognitive lights go off and you cant turn them back on
i think about frequently what my younger brother and mom were thinking and feeling as their disease progressed
when did they know they had a problem
or
at what point did their cognitive lights go out
or
i guess it was more like a dimming switch
for me i know i guess since im tested so much and i am more acutely aware of my memory i seem to be more aware of whats normal for my age and whats not normal
hopefully
it will i guess be easier for me to know when things start dimming before my lights go out before that dim switch goes click
one of my fears is that i become the opposite of the person that i am now
like my younger brother did later into his disease
like my mom did later into her disease
i dont want to go there
also i have requested that my wife she doesnt photograph me or let others photograph me as my disease progresses
i want folks to remember as i am now
i thought more about this when i looked through my cousins book she wrote on her moms dementia journey and saw the pictures of her in the wheelchair with that obvious alzheimers stare
yep
when the lights go off leave them off
the organicgreen doctor
No comments:
Post a Comment