I'm fairly new to this board so don't now if this topic has ever been covered.
This was a topic on another board recently. I got in on the tail end of the discussion, but all the stresses of caregiving can bring on dementia type symptoms in the caregiver.
Very early on, I found a wonderful EOAD support group in Fairfax, VA. The mentor had gone through the disease with her husband and she had so much insight to share. During my first meeting, she made it clear that caregivers may also feel that they are suffering the same dementia. It's brought on my stress and being way to sensitive to the minute signs of dementia in their loved one. The difference and she wanted to be sure I understood this, was that I would KNOW that I was forgetting things. My husband wouldn't. I've reassured myself with this information many times since.
In addition to short-term memory problems, a typical symptom of caregiver dementia is the inability to remember common words. This is temporary -- the word eventually comes back to you -- but can be ever so frustrating, and boy, do I have that symptom, big time!
Boy, that statement is exactly right. I use to say to my son that I felt as though I had "brain fog", I just couldn't think. I was very concerned about it, but never mentioned it to the doctor, I think I was afraid he would say I had AZ also. But after my husband passed away, I started feeling better in that way. From the time I would wake up I was "thinking", have to go to store, make beds, or whatever we ordinarily think about. But I sure started realizing how wonderful it feels to not be so stressed out that my own brain quit working!
Liz That is good information to have. I feel the same way. Over the past 2 years I have had both my Mother and my husband to care for, my Mothers memory was good until the last 6 months. Many times I don't know if I am coming or going. I have too many things on my mind, trying to do things that will keep things on an even keel. I can't imagine doing the incontenance situation. Hopefully we will skip that. lmohr
This is really interesting and I'm glad that you brought it up. I make a point of repeating things to DH several times because he is more apt to remember what I have told him. Sometimes, he tells me that I must have AZ as I am always repeating things or that I must have forgot that I told him. Yesterday, for example, he asked me several times over three hours what the date was. When I asked him what his reason for wanting to know that date, I said was it because something needed to be done on that date, he started to get angry because I must not want him to know what date it is. Also, when I am driving with DH, I tend to be way more distracted with my driving. I need to turn left but I go right. I call it autopilot. I also used to do this when my children were younger. I'm sure it is just because I am experiencing "brain overload." DH will always tell me that I must have AZ because I never remember where I am going.
Another thing that is kind of relevant here is that if I am distracted by something other than DH, he pouts. If the children are there and one of them is talking to me, if DH starts to talk (interrupts like a child) and I don't immediately acknowledge him, he gets mad at me. It doesn't cross his mind that I was talking and listening to someone else. Just that I wasn't available to listen to him. I also have hearing problems in both ears. He knows this and I have asked him many times to say my name and get my attention before he starts to tell me something. This way, I know he is talking to me. Anyway, when I don't immediately answer whatever he said, he tells me that I'm not focused, etc.
It's nice to hear that others are experiencing this also.
I can relate to all of you especially the forgetting of common words. I suffer from that big time!!
I also have fibromyalgia and suffer from "fibro fog" at times. So, between the two, sometimes I really feel out of it. A few years ago, my doc put me on 150 mg of Wellbutrin in the AM to help with the stress and sleeplessness of fibro. Last week, he upped the dosage to 150 mg twice a day. I can really feel the difference in less than a week.
Like I mentioned in another discussion, our LO's get the medication they need to help them function, but no attention is paid to the caregiver.
I've been having the word problem too. It is a lot like what happened when I was undermedicated for low thyroid disease. I get copies of my blood tests, so I know that I'm not undermedicated now. I guess just trying to remember everything for two is a good enough reason for brain fog all on its own.
Wow, i just got off phone with my son who is a dr. he said, mom why are you stuttering for 'words'??/ says he noticed it last month too. whew, i am glad i guess to know i am not the only on with caregiver burnout brainfog:)) like a lapse in thought processing or something if eventually comes to me but i have to buy time to think! yipes..scary. divvi
I am glad (well not really glad, glad) that is happening to others. Seems all of a sudden I can't remember how to pronounce certain words or names. Also, I got out of the car today & left it running. Started to go into the store, then realized I didn't have the keys to lock the doors.
This is a relief to me. I, too, have found myself unable to remember words, where I was going, etc. I felt that I just had too much going on in my brain to retain it all, but I feel better now.
I almost did the car thing too during the last month. Part of it is that we aren't paying attention to what is going on right now in front of us. Our brains are watching out for a dozen different things, so the thing we ought to be paying attention to isn't getting the attention it needs.
Besides caregiver stress and burnout causing forgetfulness and word finding problems, there are also medications that can cause these things. Lipitor, which lowers cholesterol, is supposed to help against dementia, but it also has been known to cause brain fog. (How it manages to do both is beyond me, but so many of the drug studies are contradictory) Both my cousin and I had to come off of it when it caused significant word finding problems. When we came off of it, the problem cleared up.
I have found having to be the brain for two people has sharpened mine. But it's also made me very short on patience.
Brain fog. Yep! Accounts for dialing a call on the TV remote. Dislexic typing, finding the pen I just had, in my other hand, and hunting for the cordless phone that's not in my pocket, because I'm talking on it.
As for using wrong words, hunting for words, saying the words in the wrong order in a sentence---I have a license for those things. Majored in English with a librarianship minor. <lol>
I was on Liptor for years and then last fall we switched to the generic Zocor because of the cost of the Liptor. Had my cholestero checked this spring and it was up 30 points, so I switched back and it is now down almost to where it was.
Maybe that explains my spelling and other foggy things happening. lmohrl
Oh my gosh........this is the best thread I've read in a long time. I was really beginning to think we have an AD virus in this household. Talking about it with my brother just this morning, about how I can't seem to think anymore...can find the words, can't even remember if the waitress took our order, can't remember what I was doing etc. But dialing the remote, looking for the phone while talking on it..........ROFLOL Wonderful stuff....makes me feel normal.
My ex-husband sent me an email article today (he's an M.D.) about a study that showed people who are on anti-depressants don't do well on simulated driving tests. They can't focus, etc. But now they are going to do a NEW study on people who are depressed not on antidepressants to see if it is the depression or the anti-depression meds. Who among us has not been depressed? I think that could possibly explain the brain fog in a lot of situations.
DH is having such a difficult time the last week or 10 days. He says things like that weird guy he met the other day wanted something and he didn't want to give it to him. I have no idea what he's talking about. I ask who the weird guy is. He doesn't know. He doesn't know where he saw him or what he wanted. Then he says "You know. You were there." Not true!
He's had about 1/2 dozen of these episodes like I said in the last week or 10 days. What is this? When I talk to the doctor, what do I say?
I think I'm getting pretty foggy because he insists that I know all about this. One of us has to be wrong.
Mawzy, your husband is hallucinating. Mine does it too. He thinks that I see or hear things that only he can hear or see. I just try to roll with the flow and agree with him.
I am so glad you all brought up this subject. I also have to search for the right words sometimes. I look for the car key in my purse and I already have it in my other hand. This subject was brought up at our last caregivers meeting and we were given this example. If you look for your car key and someone finds it for you and gives it to you and you don't know what it is for, then you might have something to worry about. So far I do know what it is for. LOL
My understanding is that if you can't find the right word that is one thing. But if you find it, and don't know why you wanted it, that is something else.
The real problem is that the early stages of dementia are so subtle that most of our LOs looked perfectly normal.
Do the mini-mental test on yourself. Do you know what day today is? What the year is? etc. Do you know your address and phone number? What state you are living in? The name of your town? etc.
I do have problems with the date. <grin> But I always did. I do know what it is within +/- 5 days, so I guess it isn't that bad, and I certainly can find it on the calendar. <grin> I can even work out the count back by 7, which I think is what they actually are testing because the spell WORLD backwards is something that you have to work out. No one has memorized that one.
It was cold and raining this am. Nevertheless, we went to church. After about 10 minutes I realized that I did not remember turning off the the gas logs in the living room. I had put them on while I was reading the paper. Since we live in a townhouse and I worried that I might be endangering others, we left not long into the service. DH said he thought he had turned them off but could not be sure. I realized maybe I need a day off. And yes, they were off.
Maryd, I don't think this is caregivers dementia - So many times I've gone home from work or wherever to see if I turned the coffee pot, or curling irong, etc. off. Now, of course, I make sure to buy those things that turn off after a certain amount of time. Of course, gas logs are a different matter! But I've done that too. Just brain overload!
I can't tell you how many times I have made the comment , "who's got the Alzheimer's" to one of my children, or even to one of my friends, when my mind is suddenly erased, as to what i was going to do next or whatever. happens all the time, and yes, it is brain overload.
I don't think mine is brain overload. I do so many things by habit that I am not aware that I am doing them. Later I may wonder did I take that pill or not. Maybe I am just sleepwalking through life. Hopefully I will wake up one day and realize that all the stuff happening in my life was only a dream. Fat chance.....
It's the garage door for me, I always doubt whether I closed it. Sometimes, I drive around the block just to make sure. I did leave with a jar candle burning one day, which I had never done before.
I’ve heard that it’s really good for your brain to do different routines—drive a different way home from work, put your keys on the dresser instead of on the desk, put the library books in a different location. Boy, if I did that, I’d be playing hide and seek forever. The only way I can get things done is with routines—I always park the same place at the store, everything in the house has a place (so I can remember where it is and find it), everything I need to do is written down so it actually gets done, etc. All of that “exercising” of my brain is going to have to wait, because I think trying to do it now would cause my head to explode. All my brain cells are straining every nerve to keep me functional as it is!
I'm with you Jan. I see you do what I am going to HAVE to learn and that is parking in the same place at the store or else make a point of where I park. I have walked parking lots more than enough to know I should get a plan in place.
I also try to park in the same areas. When I was working and made 10 calls in a day I sometimes forgot where I was-but as I always parked in the same place relative to the building I was ok. I do get a kick out of seeing younger people unable to find their cars sometimes.
At Christmastime Radio Shack had a one-day sale on a GPS for $99. text to speech and everything. I love it. I havent' tested it out often, just enough to know that it works well, but it really does help if you are disoriented. Bettyhere, I betcha that what happens for you is that you get directions to GO someplace, and then nobody tells you how to GO BACK HOME! and there are things like one-way streets and so on.
A particular delight of New England is that the street-sign people don't believe in signing the main street that you're ON, just the cross streets! So you have to go and go until you get to a street that's more major than the one you're on, and read its sign then.
Speaking of younger people unable to find their cars--a few months ago I met my 26 year old daughter at the mall and after we were done shopping she couldn't find her car :) She kept telling me it was stolen, and I said let's drive up and down the aisles first. Well, we found it two aisles over from where she insisted she had parked. I thought it was funny...her not so much.
Thank you one and all! You all made me laugh out loud, I shared some of the threads with my DH and he got a kick out of them. I am finding that since his dx he is a bit more relaxed and I can use some humor now :o) My Mom is always using the fact that she only has 1 kidney as her excuse for Everything, now Jim uses "well I have dementia, I can't help it" as his excuse! Aghhhh, no wonder I can't think straight!
A few years ago, DW and I were going to a hotel in Boston. I took a wrong turn off Storer Drive and ended up at Government Circle. I could see the hotel I wanted in the distance, but after 2 times around Government Circle could not find a street that wasn't one way coming in. I finally found an alley that seemed OK and took it. Maybe GPS would have helped.
marsh-driving in Boston is a nightmare. You can see where you want to go but all the streets are one way-and not going where you want to. Going from 6 lanes to two to get to the airport is an experience, too. Always hated the tunnel-even before the tiles fell down.
Once I insisted that we go to a bank in downtown Boston where I could get some Japanese Yen. They didn't have them in RI, as best I could determine, and I always like to have a little local currency when I go places, to start. (This was in 1997, a bit before there were ATMs in every airport) So my husband dropped me off at the bank and went around the block while I went in. I came back out and he wasn't there. And wasn't there. FInally I looked down the streets and saw the car crossing the intersection, 2 blocks down.. I went racing down the street, and of course I couldn't catch him; I kept looking up and down the streets and finally found him. He was totally lost. Said I AM NEVER GOING TO DRIVE IN BOSTON AGAIN!!! And he didn't. I did, but he didn't.
And bluedaze, you haven't mentioned the trucks that park in the middle of the street to unload because someone's parking in the LOADING ZONE. I can't stand it either!
I lived in a suburb of Boston for 30 years. I drove into Boston ONCE. ONCE. That was enough. Anytime I wanted to go into the city after that, I just took the commuter rail train.
As for caregiver dementia - Sid and I went to the gym in our development this afternoon. I was finished before him, so I drove into town(2 miles) for an errand. I drove back, and completely forgot about him. I drove right by the gym toward home when my cell rang. Oops. I turned around to get him. I was laughing. He was not amused.
marsh, my FIL lived in Boston. We went for a visit, which I shall never forget. He drove while we were there (only a crazy person willingly drives in Boston) and scared me so badly I actually got down on the floor of the car at one point. He happily whizzed along one-way streets going the wrong way, and when I frantically pointed it out (the first time or two) he said well, yeah, but he'd have to go six blocks out of his way to find a street going the other way.