JOAN’S WEEKEND BLOG – OCTOBER 23/24 2010 – TEENAGE REBELLION AND MY AD HUSBAND

It is often at the oddest times in the most unlikely places that an incident triggers a blog. That is what happened Friday in the hair salon. While I was sitting in the chair getting my lovely locks cut and colored, the teenage daughter of the woman in the chair next to me, came up to her mother. I am guessing the girl was around 14 or 15. Having worked for over 10 years with middle and high students, and having survived those years with one of my own, I was not surprised to hear the disrespectful, negative, whining complaints that spewed from her mouth. Apparently she was miserable that she had to wait for her mother in the hair salon, but certainly did not want to be home either. “I’m not a home body”, she whined to her mother. “I need to be out doing things.” Whine. Whine. Whine. Bad attitude .  Basically, the reasons we are sitting in that chair getting the gray in our hair covered up.

 What struck me was not the girl’s mouthiness, but the mother’s arguing with her. Every time the girl had a complaint, the mother counteracted with a reprimand and a suggestion to make things better for the girl. They went back and forth, back and forth. It was obvious to me that the girl was NOT going to be appeased, no matter what the mother said.  She was a teenager, exhibiting the worst of teenage behavior, and there was no reasoning with her. But the mother continued to try. That is when it hit me. I may as well have been listening to myself and my AD husband go round and round, before I learned that I could not argue with someone whose reasoning button was broken.

I wanted to say to the mother – “Stop arguing with her. Tell her to sit down. Her reasoning button has not fully developed yet. End of story." Of course, I said nothing, but it made me think about my husband. His behavior can be, if I let it, exactly like that of the teenage girl. Whining. Arguing. Begging to do something. Pouting. I used to become stressed and nauseous trying to make him see reason. Now I do not give him the ammunition for an argument. I let him sputter, while I say nothing or a simple “no”.  It is difficult to argue without an argument partner.

I never doubted Dr. Barry Reisberg’s theory of retrogenesis and Alzheimer’s Disease. His premise is that AD patients go through all of the developmental stages – backwards - starting as cognitively mature adults, and ending as totally dependent infants. However, watching this teenager’s antics parallel those of my 67 year old husband, was like watching his theory come alive.

My husband has regressed to a teen rebellion stage, and I have to treat him accordingly. For those of you who are unfamiliar with retrogenesis, I would encourage you to click the link above and read about it more thoroughly. Before retrogenesis settled in the back of my mind, jolted forward by the teenager in the hair salon, it was a huge help to me in understanding my husband’s behavior and how to handle it.

Every experience in life teaches us something. The knowledge we gain through those life experiences can be drawn upon at any time to help us deal with new situations. In this case, the child rearing knowledge we accumulated can now help us with AD behavior. I wish it were not so. I have mentioned many times in previous blogs that I want a husband, not a child, but I am not going to get what I want. I am supposed to be the mature adult here, so I realize that whining about it is not going to change the situation. I just have to deal with it, armed with as much knowledge as possible to help me through.

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