Last night a 30 minute program aired about care of the caregiver. I think it was just local which is a shame. Next Wed will be the follow up. What pleased me is that help numbers were repeated over and over giving you the chance to write things down. It was interesting to see local day care and recognize the people. It helps "take the shame" out of the disease. I hope to see the day when Alzheimer's is not something to joke about. It hurts when so called comedians think forgetting is amusing.
THIS REMINDS ME OF THINGS A YOUNG NEIGHBOR WOULD SAY. WHEN MY DH FIRST STARTED HAVE OBVIOUS MEMORY PROBLEMS,THAT OTHER PEOPLE NOTICED,A VERY CLOSE NEIGHBOR WOULD JOKE AND SAY 'HE'S GOT ALZHEIMERS" AND THINK IT WAS FUNNY. ONE DAY HE WAS AT OUR HOUSE,AND HE WAS GOING ON AND HE SAID THIS AND I TOLD HIM I BETTER NOT EVER HEAR THAT COME OUT OF HIS MOUTH AGAIN,IT WAS THE JOKING THAT REALLY GOT ME. WHEN HE LOST THE TRACTOR IN THE FIELD,HIS BROTHERS,THEIR WIVES AND HIS SISTER TNOUGHT THAT WAS REALLY FUNNY AND HAD A BIG LAUGH ABOUT THAT. I FOUND NOTHING FUNNY IN THAT EITHER.ONE SISTER IN LAW LATER SAID THEY DIDN'T MEAN ANY THING BY IT BUT PEOPLE NEED TO STOP AND THINK ABOUT WHAT THEY ARE SAYING AND HOW IT HURTS. THERE IS NOTHING FUNNY ABOUT THIS TERRIBLE DISEASE AND IT IS NO LAUGHING MATTER. I KNOW WE HAVE TO FIND SOME HUMOR SOMEWAY,BUT I JUST CAN'T LAUGHT AT MY DH AND I WON'T ALLOW ANY ONE ELSE TO. I HAVE TO PROTECT HIM AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE.HE IS HURTING WAY TO MUCH ,WITHOUT ANY HELP FROM OTHERS.
Absolutely. THERE IS NO SHAME IN THIS DISEASE, it is a disease just like any other that cannot be helped the only problem is that it is the saddest of all diseases and the person should have the most compassion of anyone on the face of this earth. I could smack the people who made fun, there is nothing amusing at all and they may be faced with it someday themselves.
I don't want to get started this has hit a nerve with me.
That PBS program was specifically local. It tried to explain the plight of AD caregivers. I don't think it did a particularly good job of it - anyone who has not lived with the disease really didn't get the depth of despair or emotional upheaval AD causes from the program. At least I don't think so. If I can get a video of it, or at least a transcript, I will put it up on the website. For those in the South Florida area, it is WXEL. There will be another program next week - Wed. April 30 at 7 PM - panel discussion and telethon.
I think a lot of PBS stations are doing local programming on dementia. Our "local" PBS station did it as well about a week or two ago. There was one program that wasn't local, but not the one that a lot of the rest of you saw, followed up with a local Town Hall type program. I taped them because I burned out on having 2 hours of this stuff at one time.
Our true local station didn't do any of this.
I have Direct TV and not cable. They gave everone in Eastern PA a "local group" of stations that includes all of the Philly stations and all of the Allentown stations. The Philly stations include a southern NJ PBS station, so I get that one too. Allentown has a PBS station (with really bad reception even on Direct TV) as well. The station that did the dementia programming was the NJ station.