Discussing
my project with my Nana and Granddad proved to be useful. After beginning my
project with temporary and deciding to look into more detail on the subjects of
memories, diseases that affect the memory and childhood, I decided to discuss
this with my grand-parents who then inform me that my Great-granddad George
died of one of the diseases I had previously researched- Alzheimer’s. I was
only 2 at the time of his death which is why I don’t remember much about him or
the illness he suffered from, so I began to ask them about how he changed and
they began to tell me stories about how he was with the disease.
One of the main things they told
me that stood out was that he didn’t recognise himself when looking in the
mirror and because he didn’t recognise himself when he looked out through a
window he used to phone the police thinking someone was trying to break-in. To
not remember loved ones faces must be hard enough but to not recognise you must
have been frightening and lonely, feelings that we could not comprehend.
They reckon that my
Great-granddad had Alzheimer’s for 4 years; it became apparent when his partner
Elsie died. Granddad George’s symptoms worsened after 2 years, his daughters
and sons all taken care of him until it became too much to handle. He was
placed in a care home for 12 months before he passed away.
His symptoms whilst they taken
care of him were agitation, loneliness, difference in personality, changed his
appearance to not caring, confusion and eventually tube fed because he couldn’t
remember how to swallow- it is like a baby trapped in a man’s body. It must
have been awful to watch the person you love die away with nothing to do but
watch. My nana said it was like caring for someone she had never met before
because she knew he had already died.
The brain shuts down gradually
taking the person piece by piece. They said he ‘looked straight through them’
at times. He could remember years ago but just forgot recent stuff; he had no
concept of time, the days and nights merged together. Some people call it the
‘Living Death Disease’. They also said he repeated a lot of things over and
over again, confused and senseless.
My
Nana told me a story of how my older brother and sister asked my Great-granddad
to draw with them, he didn’t understand first and after they explained and
repeated what they was asking, they told him to not colour outside the lines,
my Nana said he sat there for hours colouring in this picture without going out
the lines, it was like him learning a new skill and revisiting childhood, this
disease takes a person back to being the vulnerable baby they once started out
as.
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