Hi, my mother has been diagnosed with Alzheimer's and I take turns with my family in looking after her, but I've recently become more worried about my own memory. I've had a very stressful time having lost my 29 year old son in a car accident 9 months ago and my dad died a few months ago, although I was still numb from my sons death then. I took early retirement from work (as a nurse) 3 years ago, I'm 57 now. I wasn't coping with the stress of the job and had worked full time for over 30 years. I went back to work just as relief on the bank, and found working occasional days actually helped me, it even helped with the grief after losing my son because it's a sociable job where you have to talk to lots of people and it helped. What worries me now is that if I go the doctor about my memory (I work with my own GP!) if I am diagnosed it means I won't be considered able to work. So I daren't go and see the doctor.
Implications for work
- Thread starter Jenny57
- Start date
The first thing that strikes me is what a well written and well thought out post. I wonder if your memory lapses are simply due to your losses and stress and the physical toll on your health and nerves. Reasoning goes as well as memory with something like Alz and frankly that is not how you sound.
Can you get a Well Woman check on your general health and step up the good things in your diet as well as exercise and relaxing. You have been through a hard year maybe your mind and body are resisting.
Can you get a Well Woman check on your general health and step up the good things in your diet as well as exercise and relaxing. You have been through a hard year maybe your mind and body are resisting.
I have a bad memory whenever I am clinically depressed. I have patches of my life I have little or no memory of. Normally my memory is reasonable. There are all sorts of other reasons for memory lapses. It doesn't have to be dementia, even if you have it in the family.
Thyroid problems, vitamin deficiency and stress and trauma, grief can all cause the problems you are having. I think if your memory was that bad then your GP would notice and might have said something.
Thyroid problems, vitamin deficiency and stress and trauma, grief can all cause the problems you are having. I think if your memory was that bad then your GP would notice and might have said something.
Thankyou, yes that makes sense, I was feeling depressed and overwhelmed even before my son died. It does worry me how little I can remember sometimes, it's almost as though I make no effort to remember things, it's hard to explain. It came to the fore with my son dying and my daughter saying things like do you remember when... And I couldn't remember. It's sad, and it makes me feel panicky. There are big areas of my life that I just don't remember. I think I have trouble focusing on things, when someone speaks to me I often find myself thinking of something else. Odd, but I suppose that's how I am. Depression is awful, I had never suffered with it before and when I couldn't force myself out of bed in a morning and was worrying about getting up I saw the GP and got antidepressants. Then my son died. I'm just weaning off them now. I'll wait until they clear my system and I'm fully off them and see if my thinking is any clearer. Thanks again x
Not a medic but what you've said sounds like a classic illustration of someone attending to the really critical things in her life (your grief over such punishing losses, all happening in such a short period of time, your difficulty in settling into an unwanted new world, etc) and so not able to spend time thinking about the less critical (to the inner you) or less urgent matters.
As well as the work you do, would it help to spend a bit more of your time doing mindless but steady and productive things? The idea would be to give your mind space to roam and get on with the things you think important. The sole point of the "busyness" would be to help you stay relatively relaxed while you do this thinking.
The mindless tasks I do in this situation include cleaning the skirting boards and the oven!
