JOAN’S WEEKEND BLOG – APRIL 10/11, 2010- SELECTIVE MEMORY

Most spouses are aware of the phrase, “selective hearing”.  It is a condition from which wives insist their husbands suffer. Some husbands also believe their wives are afflicted with it. Maybe one’s husband will be deaf to the pleas to take out the garbage, mow the lawn, or pick up his clothes that are strewn on the bedroom floor, but, no matter how quietly the wife may say, “I’m in the mood” , he will hear it from three rooms away. In other words, we hear what we choose to hear.

Memory loss due to Alzheimer’s Disease is real. We are all acutely aware of just how real it is, and how much of a devastating impact it has on our spousal relationship. Yet, sometimes I cannot help but wonder – similar to “selective hearing”, is it possible there is “selective memory” going on in Alzheimer’s Disease?

I have relayed many Alzheimer conversations that take place in my house, demonstrating severe short term memory loss, and you have told me that I must be living in your house, as the discourses are so similar:

SWD (spouse with dementia): Did you write the list for the grocery store?
Me: Yes
SWD: When are we going to the grocery store?
Me: When I finish doing the laundry.
SWD: Okay
15 minutes later:
SWD: When are we going to the grocery store?
Me: When I finish doing the laundry.
SWD: Did you write the grocery list?
Me: Yes
15 minutes later:
SWD: Did you write the grocery list?
Me: Yes

You know the drill – it goes on every day, all day, in all of our houses. Then there was yesterday. I came home from the gym, and Sid said to me, “Margie (from Massachusetts) called. She was on her lunch break, and figured it was a good time to catch up. Don’t call her back now, because her lunch break is over. Call her tonight.”

I was more than a bit surprised that he remembered to tell me of a phone call that occurred at least an hour before, but imagine my shock when I called Margie that night. She told me that during her conversation with him, he remembered that she and her husband were coming to visit this summer. He remembered that they were staying on Hutchinson Island instead of Vero Beach, where they usually stay. AND he remembered that her husband had called him last week, from the car, while she was driving to their son’s house.

So how much of the usual drama queen idiot did I sound like when I replied, “ Declining steadily”, to her query as to how he was doing?

I do not understand it. The hippocampus, the part of the brain responsible for short term memory, shrinks and finally disappears, when attacked by Alzheimer’s Disease. I can tell how much Sid’s hippocampus has shrunk in the last 4 years from the progression of his short term memory loss. So where does this “selective memory” come from? How is it possible that he cannot remember who won a baseball game he has just left, but can remember all of my friend’s vacation information, of which he has not been reminded in weeks?

You can be sure that I am not going to stress over it. I am just curious about it. It does not make sense, and I was wondering if your spouses’ experience similar “selective memories.”  Please share your stories on the message boards: Joan’s Weekend Blog – Selective Memory.

Feedback to joan@thealzheimerspouse.com

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The Alzheimer Spouse LLC
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