Please note that this is a personal story submitted by an About.com reader.
Hello There:
My father has Alzheimers Disease. He is in a Retirement Home in Northern Ontario.
He is on Hydrochlorothiazide, ASA Enteric, Olanzapine, Donepezil. He was put in the home for his own good.
My father's mom had dementia, also. I feel he got it by having a very bad car accident in 1997, as he started to show signs back then. In 1998, he remarried, after a 20 year stretch as a single man again. It was not a good marriage, as he wasn't aware that she was an alcoholic, and had problems of her own.
Later in that year he was diagnosed with Prostate Cancer, which was successfully removed. At the time of the operation, he couldn't be put on Aricept, and his doctor hadn't made up his mind that Dad had in fact, Alzheimers Disease. Without his medication, his frustration at not being able to communicate made him have rages of anger. And a lot of the time his wife was the brunt of it. However, her being a nagger, didn't help.
I went up to his residence in 2003, and took over Power of Attorney for my fathers financial and medical health. He told me at the time that he was happy I was doing that. That it had become too much for him to handle.
His own property is still up there, and has been legally taken back into his estates control. I am also executor of his will, and benefactor. I still have a lot of financial things to do with dad's estate, and have made sure that I got counselling into the matter.
It's very hard to think of this happening to my father, who was really into physical conditioning, to have something happen to his mind. But there is nothing you can do but contain the problem, have them on their meds, and deal with the situation.
I am,
Evelyn
