Before the Diagnosis: Stories of Life and Love Before Dementia

Before the Diagnosis: Stories of Life and Love Before Dementia PDF Author: Gincy Heins
Publisher: Lulu.com
ISBN: 1387621823
Category : Family & Relationships
Languages : en
Pages : 164

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Book Description
This book is a love story and a labor of love. It is an anthology of stories by 36 authors, each about a relative they have known and loved before that person was diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease or another type of dementia. First and foremost, these stories are about human beings. They are about moms, dads, attorneys, teachers, sailors, dreamers, doers, and lovers. They are about people like you and me; people with hopes and plans for the future who lived, or are still living, a life worth remembering. I hope what you read in these pages touches your life.

Before the Diagnosis: Stories of Life and Love Before Dementia

Before the Diagnosis: Stories of Life and Love Before Dementia PDF Author: Gincy Heins
Publisher: Lulu.com
ISBN: 1387621823
Category : Family & Relationships
Languages : en
Pages : 164

Get Book

Book Description
This book is a love story and a labor of love. It is an anthology of stories by 36 authors, each about a relative they have known and loved before that person was diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease or another type of dementia. First and foremost, these stories are about human beings. They are about moms, dads, attorneys, teachers, sailors, dreamers, doers, and lovers. They are about people like you and me; people with hopes and plans for the future who lived, or are still living, a life worth remembering. I hope what you read in these pages touches your life.

Before the Diagnosis

Before the Diagnosis PDF Author: Gincy Heins
Publisher: Independently Published
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
Worldwide, there are over 55 million people who have been diagnosed with some form of dementia. Whether it is Alzheimer's, Lewy-body, vascular, mild cognitive impairment, or another type, each of these individuals is more than their diagnosis. They are a person with a rich, vibrant history, and people who love them. It is because of this that Before the Diagnosis: More Stories of Life and Love Before Dementia was written. Continuing in the style of Before the Diagnosis: Stories of Life and Love Before Dementia, the stories of the 23 individuals in this book introduce us to more people with a life worth remembering. In the pages of this book, some of the people you'll meet are a well-loved teacher, a shop owner, a good gift-giver, cyclists, parents, spouses, an acupuncturist, a family physician, a marathoner, and an artistic storyteller. Two women who were both young when they were diagnosed with a type of dementia wrote positively about their lives since their diagnoses, with their first-hand accounts bookending the other essays. We all need to remember that people with any type of diagnosis, whether it is a form of dementia or something else entirely, are so much more than their diagnosis. They are people. Remind people they are so much more than a medical condition. Find out about people. Share their story, and share yours as well. I hope you are touched by what you read on the pages of this book. Your purchase of this book supports the work of Alzheimer's Orange County since 100% of the sales of the book are donated to them. You can find out more about the work they do at www.alzoc.org.

Before I Forget

Before I Forget PDF Author: Barbara Smith
Publisher: Harmony
ISBN: 0553447122
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 338

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Book Description
"Working with Vanity Fair contributing editor Michael Shnayerson, B. and her husband Dan share B.'s unfolding story on dealing with early-onset Alzheimer's. Crafted in short chapters that interweave their narrative with ... advice, readers learn in small bites about dealing with Alzheimer's disease's day-to-day challenges, the family tensions, and ways of coping, as well as gain tips on diet and exercise from a lifestyle maven using her decades of expertise in a new and unexpected way"--

Keeping Love Alive as Memories Fade

Keeping Love Alive as Memories Fade PDF Author: Gary Chapman
Publisher: Moody Publishers
ISBN: 0802494412
Category : Family & Relationships
Languages : en
Pages : 240

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Book Description
Across America and around the world, the five love languages have revitalized relationships and saved marriages from the brink of disaster. Can they also help individuals, couples, and families cope with the devastating diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease (AD)? Coauthors Chapman, Shaw, and Barr give a resounding yes. Their innovative application of the five love languages creates an entirely new way to touch the lives of the five million Americans who have Alzheimer’s, as well as their fifteen million caregivers. At its heart, this book is about how love gently lifts a corner of dementia’s dark curtain to cultivate an emotional connection amid memory loss. This collaborative, groundbreaking work between a healthcare professional, caregiver, and relationship expert will: Provide an overview of the love languages and Alzheimer’s disease, correlate the love languages with the developments of the stages of AD, discuss how both the caregiver and care receiver can apply the love languages, address the challenges and stresses of the caregiver journey, offer personal stories and case studies about maintaining emotional intimacy amidst AD. Keeping Love Alive as Memories Fade is heartfelt and easy to apply, providing gentle, focused help for those feeling overwhelmed by the relational toll of Alzheimer’s. Its principles have already helped hundreds of families, and it can help yours, too.

Before I Forget

Before I Forget PDF Author: B. Smith
Publisher: Harmony
ISBN: 0553447157
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 338

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Book Description
“A powerful portrait of Alzheimer’s…marked by strong emotions and often bleak honesty.” —The Washington Post “The vulnerability, courage, and honesty in Before I Forget are heart-opening. Fear can be paralyzing…yet B. and Dan beautifully demonstrate that there is a different way to approach this stealthy invader. Alzheimer’s needs to come out of the shadows, and this book is an important step.” —Maria Shriver Restaurateur, magazine publisher, celebrity chef, and nationally known lifestyle maven, B. Smith is struggling at 66 with a tag she never expected to add to that string: Alzheimer's patient. She’s not alone. Every 67 seconds someone newly develops it, and millions of lives are affected by its aftershocks. B. and her husband, Dan, working with Vanity Fair contributing editor Michael Shnayerson, unstintingly share their unfolding story. Crafted in short chapters that interweave their narrative with practical and helpful advice, readers learn about dealing with Alzheimer's day-to-day challenges: the family realities and tensions, ways of coping, coming research that may tip the scale, as well as lessons learned along the way. At its heart, Before I Forget is a love story: illuminating a love of family, life, and hope.

The Last Ocean

The Last Ocean PDF Author: Nicci Gerrard
Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 0525521984
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 274

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Book Description
From the award-winning journalist and author, a lyrical, raw and humane investigation of dementia that explores both the journeys of the people who live with the condition and those of their loved ones After a diagnosis of dementia, Nicci Gerrard’s father, John, continued to live life on his own terms, alongside the disease. But when an isolating hospital stay precipitated a dramatic turn for the worse, Gerrard, an award-winning journalist and author, recognized that it was not just the disease, but misguided protocol and harmful practices that cause such pain at the end of life. Gerrard was inspired to seek a better course for all who suffer because of the disease. The Last Ocean is Gerrard’s investigation into what dementia does to both the person who lives with the condition and to their caregivers. Dementia is now one of the leading causes of death in the West, and this necessary book will offer both comfort and a map to those walking through it. While she begins with her father’s long slip into forgetting, Gerrard expands to examine dementia writ large. Gerrard gives raw but literary shape both to the unimaginable loss of one’s own faculties, as well as to the pain of their loved ones. Her lens is unflinching, but Gerrard honors her subjects and finds the beauty and the humanity in their seemingly diminished states. In so doing, she examines the philosophy of what it means to have a self, as well as how we can offer dignity and peace to those who suffer with this terrible disease. Not only will it aid those walking with dementia patients, The Last Ocean will prompt all of us to think on the nature of a life well lived.

Blue Hydrangeas

Blue Hydrangeas PDF Author: Marianne Sciucco
Publisher: Bunky Press
ISBN: 9780989559201
Category : Alzheimer's disease
Languages : en
Pages : 247

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Book Description
What if the person who knew you best and loved you most forgot your face, and couldn't remember your name? A nursing facility is everyone's solution for what to do about Sara, but her husband, Jack, can't bear to live without her. He is committed to saving his marriage, his wife, and their life together from the devastation of Alzheimer's disease. He and Sara retired years ago to the house of their dreams, and operated it as a Cape Cod bed and breakfast named Blue Hydrangeas. Jack has made an impossible promise: He and Sara will stay together in their beautiful home no matter what the disease brings. However, after nine years of selfless caregiving, complicated by her progressing Alzheimer's and his own failing heart, he finally admits he can no longer care for her at home. With reluctance, he arranges to admit her to an assisted living facility. But, on the day of admission, Sara is having one of her few good days, and he is unable to follow through. Instead, he takes them on an impulsive journey to confront their past and reclaim their future. In the end, he realizes that staying together at any cost is what truly matters.

On Vanishing

On Vanishing PDF Author: Lynn Casteel Harper
Publisher: Catapult
ISBN: 1948226294
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 126

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Book Description
A New York Times Book Review Editors’ Choice An essential book for those coping with Alzheimer’s and other cognitive disorders that “reframe[s] our understanding of dementia with sensitivity and accuracy . . . to grant better futures to our loved ones and ourselves” (The New York Times). An estimated fifty million people in the world suffer from dementia. Diseases such as Alzheimer's erase parts of one's memory but are also often said to erase the self. People don't simply die from such diseases; they are imagined, in the clichés of our era, as vanishing in plain sight, fading away, or enduring a long goodbye. In On Vanishing, Lynn Casteel Harper, a Baptist minister and nursing home chaplain, investigates the myths and metaphors surrounding dementia and aging, addressing not only the indignities caused by the condition but also by the rhetoric surrounding it. Harper asks essential questions about the nature of our outsized fear of dementia, the stigma this fear may create, and what it might mean for us all to try to “vanish well.” Weaving together personal stories with theology, history, philosophy, literature, and science, Harper confronts our elemental fears of disappearance and death, drawing on her own experiences with people with dementia both in the American healthcare system and within her own family. In the course of unpacking her own stories and encounters—of leading a prayer group on a dementia unit; of meeting individuals dismissed as “already gone” and finding them still possessed of complex, vital inner lives; of witnessing her grandfather’s final years with Alzheimer’s and discovering her own heightened genetic risk of succumbing to the disease—Harper engages in an exploration of dementia that is unlike anything written before on the subject. A rich and startling work of nonfiction, On Vanishing reveals cognitive change as it truly is, an essential aspect of what it means to be mortal.

The Last Ten Days - Academia, Dementia, and the Choice to Die

The Last Ten Days - Academia, Dementia, and the Choice to Die PDF Author: Martha Risberg Brosio
Publisher: Myers Education Press
ISBN: 1975501837
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 271

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Book Description
The Last Ten Days addresses the concerns of loved ones and caregivers, providing them not only with information but also acknowledging the sadness and frustration, the heartache and bittersweet memories experienced during this painful time. To these readers, the book says, “You are not alone.” The Last Ten Days: Academia, Dementia, and the Choice to Die is a heartrending memoir of love, scholarship, dignity, courage, and the choices one is forced to make when given the devastating diagnosis of a terminal illness. Spanning sixty years, this extraordinary book recounts the love story of Martha Risberg Brosio and her husband, Richard Brosio, Ph.D., a brilliant scholar and college professor whose communication skills dazzled all with whom he came in contact. Teenage sweethearts who went their separate ways after high school, Martha and Richard reconnected twenty-six years later over a friendly dinner that sparked into passionate love. They married in 1983, enjoying a vibrant life. Then tragedy struck. In late 2013, Richard was diagnosed with Primary Progressive Aphasia, a type of dementia similar to Alzheimer’s that affects the frontal and temporal lobes of the brain. The disease impacted Richard’s ability to communicate. Eventually, he would lose his verbal and processing skills. There was no cure. Determined to have a dignified death at the time and in the manner of his own choosing, Richard hastened his death two years after his diagnosis by voluntarily stopping eating and drinking, seeking only palliative and hospice care until the end. Reminiscent of Still Alice, The Notebook, Tuesdays with Morrie, and When Breath Becomes Air, The Last Ten Days grabs the heartstrings and gives a mighty tug.

In Love

In Love PDF Author: Amy Bloom
Publisher: Random House
ISBN: 0593243943
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 241

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Book Description
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • A powerful memoir of a love that leads two people to find a courageous way to part—and a woman’s struggle to go forward in the face of loss—that “enriches the reader’s life with urgency and gratitude” (The Washington Post) “A pleasure to read . . . Rarely has a memoir about death been so full of life. . . . Bloom has a talent for mixing the prosaic and profound, the slapstick and the serious.”—USA Today ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR: NPR Amy Bloom began to notice changes in her husband, Brian: He retired early from a new job he loved; he withdrew from close friendships; he talked mostly about the past. Suddenly, it seemed there was a glass wall between them, and their long walks and talks stopped. Their world was altered forever when an MRI confirmed what they could no longer ignore: Brian had Alzheimer’s disease. Forced to confront the truth of the diagnosis and its impact on the future he had envisioned, Brian was determined to die on his feet, not live on his knees. Supporting each other in their last journey together, Brian and Amy made the unimaginably difficult and painful decision to go to Dignitas, an organization based in Switzerland that empowers a person to end their own life with dignity and peace. In this heartbreaking and surprising memoir, Bloom sheds light on a part of life we so often shy away from discussing—its ending. Written in Bloom’s captivating, insightful voice and with her trademark wit and candor, In Love is an unforgettable portrait of a beautiful marriage, and a boundary-defying love.