Spouses and Partners

Over 6 years ago my best friend and lover, my husband Donald, was diagnosed with dementia. It began with him not being able to remember how to manage a program as a engineer. This man holds a BS in engineering and MS in computer Science. He has managed projects for such companies as Boeing Commercial Aircraft company, in the Aerospace industry and finally in a small company close to his home. I begin to notice he forgot to turn off the stove, placing items in placese where they shouldn't be. He also began to forget to do simple things like lock the door.

My husband disguised it well, but I knew.  I had known for the last seven or eight years.

Red was sixty-five and I was forty-seven. We had been married for sixteen years. The eighteen years between us never made a difference. His sense of humor, wit, intelligence, and gift of gab were incomparable, his laughter contagious. He was a knight in shining armor for me and for his family. He had always surpassed me mentally and physically. Until now…

I am a brand-new caregiver. For almost two years my wife has been suffering from dementia, the category into which she was placed after the discovery that her spinal fluid had been misrouted through her brain - in my engineering mind, she had a valve fail. She had been able to do some chores around the house but her real persona had been disrupted. Then three weeks ago, she suffered a mini-stroke, called a TIA. It really changed her. The things she had been able to do before it hit were difficult or impossible for her now.

My beautiful wife of 54 years started with Alzheimer's disease 7 years ago and now is unable to do anything for herself and must be cared for 24/7. Sad thing is we have 8 beautiful grandchildren and she is unable to know them or her 4 children and will ask me where her husband is. We, all of the country, must understand this disease and help in any way they can, with contributions, or just help your neighbors.

My name is Aaralyn Oakley-Wheeler, and lost my husband to the merciless disease of early onset Alzheimers/Picks Disease in December of 2009. Jim was a retired officer of the U.S. Marine Corp. A tall, straping handsome man. He was diagnosed in early March of 2006, upon finding out that he was having difficulty performing his job. He had retired for the Marines in 1995 and worked as an Infrastructure Analyst at DSCC (government facility). To say that my life stopped on a dime that day would be an understatement.

My early up-close-and-personal experience with Alzheimer's was when my mother-in-law Bea Lerner called at 3am to complain about a strange man in her house. My wife and life-partner, Trish, and I immediately went there to find only one man in the house, her husband. When asked about a strange man, Bea pulled us aside and carefully pointed to her husband, saying "that's the strange man, he's nice but I don't know him". After that, the powerful pull of the Alzheimer's downward spiraling trajectory never let up.

My wife died about three years after diagnosis with frontal lobe dementia, a neurological disease similar to Alzheimer's. I cared for her at home for the first year, until that put me into the hospital for 11 days (my third hospitalization-first was my birth, second my tonsils). The day I went into the hospital, La Verna went into a nursing home, where she spent her last two years. For the next two years I visited her all but two days, although I'm not sure she was very aware of me the last year. She's been gone over four years now, but I still tear-up just about every day.

"Early onset Alzheimer's Disease..EOAD for short knocked on our door over 7 years ago and came in and wont leave till it had stolen my husband away from me, Mick and I met late in life on a blind date 18 years ago this July 1st,About 8/9 years ago there was warning signs looking back now I know this but did not know this at the time.

EOAD – How these four letters changed our lives forever. EOAD – I had never heard of this before but, I know I will never forget it. Early-Onset Alzheimer’s Disease is the name given to Alzheimer‘s Disease when a person younger than 65 is diagnosed. My husband’s age was a major obstacle in just trying to get a doctor to seriously consider his memory problems at the age of 48 following cancer surgery. I wish now that I had been much more persistent then and not waited until he had a rapid decline. But, how were we to know that this could and would happen, especially at his age?