Saturday, June 14, 2008

Today I left Mom for a couple hours on her own while I dashed to a caregiver support group. The support group was useful even though only one other caregiver showed up. It really shows me just how much I have learned about ALZ and being a caregiver as I was able to offer this person all sorts of support. Mom had an accident while she was home alone so the days of leaving her alone are over. She was very recalcitrant about clean up too. She was yelling at me. Now she is dozing in her chair, something that is becoming even more commonplace. The caregivers have reported it too. The doctor feels that this is due to progression of the disease. One interesting thing that came up in the support group was that research has shown that many Alz patients have experienced a head injury at some point after age 50 and that this trauma might be tied to the onset on Alz. Mom fell in the garage when she tripped over the cord of some Christmas lights that she had taken off the bushes. She definitely hit her head because it was all bloodied and bruised. I'm just curious if others have LO's who had fallen prior to the onset.

I love the new blog list feature of blogger. It's great! I can see which of my favorite blogs have been updated recently.

4 comments:

nancy said...

interesting post robyn about the head injury link. can't say i can remember russ having a fall but maybe he did and i just never knew.

~Betsy said...

Mom took a terrible fall while walking to the store in her little town once. I think it happened about 15 years ago. She claimed she didn't hit her head, but a gal I went to high school with came upon her right after she fell and I was told Mom was really dazed and confused. I have often wondered if this was related to her AD or if it was one of her infamous TIA's.

Come to think of it, Mom had many falls. She was pretty clumsy, mostly because she had survived polio as a baby and her right foot never sat squarely. She walked on the side of her foot more than the sole. Hmm....interesting things to think about.

Annie said...

I don't remember Mom ever having a head injury.

Esther Altshul Helfgott said...

Abe never had a head injury. Have you read any research on this?

I always thought Abe's AD emerged after hip replacement surgery. Perhaps he had it before and the anaesthesia exacerbated the condition. Anyone have this experience?

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