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DeeDee57

Registered User
Jun 15, 2015
2
0
Romford
Hi, my husband is 61 and was diagnosed with dementia officially last June, so a year ago. I had my suspicions that something was wrong at least four years prior to that but can put some things back to around 2008 so have been living a very strange life for quite a while now! He is on medication and with no ill affects fortunately. I have accepted he has dementia but cannot accept, at the moment, the impact this has had and is having on my life. I work four days a week and will continue to as that is my salvation. My husband did not want to be told if the results of his test showed he had dementia so I have acceded to that. Most things I deal with but after a year of him not bathing I was told I should be firmer and now for the last five weeks he has bathed on a Sunday with assistance from me. He does not like it but I could not go on with him not being clean. I think he knows when he needs a shave because he still does this himself without me helping. He does not clean his teeth and yet he was so particular about his teeth. I could go on but as this is my first post I won't. I have good days and bad days, like him I suppose. My main reason for this post is that I really would like to be in touch with carers at a similar stage and age group. Anyone out there?
 

katie1

Registered User
Aug 5, 2014
122
0
Kendal Cumbria
Welcome to the forum DeeDee57 although I am not in your position (my Dad has dementia and after a collapse and being in hospital is now in a nursing home) but there will be others on here who are going through similar experiences and will be able to give you more support. Every person with dementia is just that.....a person with dementia and often very different from another, but there can be common traits. So keep looking in on TP and read round the forums, you will learn a lot!
 

leicester61

Registered User
Aug 26, 2012
146
0
Leicestershire
Hi, my husband is 61 and was diagnosed with dementia officially last June, so a year ago. I had my suspicions that something was wrong at least four years prior to that but can put some things back to around 2008 so have been living a very strange life for quite a while now! He is on medication and with no ill affects fortunately. I have accepted he has dementia but cannot accept, at the moment, the impact this has had and is having on my life. I work four days a week and will continue to as that is my salvation. My husband did not want to be told if the results of his test showed he had dementia so I have acceded to that. Most things I deal with but after a year of him not bathing I was told I should be firmer and now for the last five weeks he has bathed on a Sunday with assistance from me. He does not like it but I could not go on with him not being clean. I think he knows when he needs a shave because he still does this himself without me helping. He does not clean his teeth and yet he was so particular about his teeth. I could go on but as this is my first post I won't. I have good days and bad days, like him I suppose. My main reason for this post is that I really would like to be in touch with carers at a similar stage and age group. Anyone out there?
Hi DeeDee
My OH was diagnosed about 3 yrs ago aged 52, but like you i can now probably look back many yrs before that where there was something not right. Just wanted to let you know I come onto the site a few times a week usually mon, tues and weds as thats when im at work and have access to a pc,,so im around if you would like to chat, ask questions etc. I spent the first couple of years fighting for (the very little) financial help we could get, it seems to be harder when your younger to access anything, although to be honest there is little or no support where i live, luckily have good family and friends support, but thats not always what you need, i think probably the best place for me so far has been here, so much experience on this site that if you have a question or problem someone can come up with the answers. anyway you have definetly come to the right place, thinking of you
suzanne x
 

DeeDee57

Registered User
Jun 15, 2015
2
0
Romford
Two years on ...

Can't believe I've survived the last two years without losing my sanity. My dear husband is now in a care home (since March this year). He is incontinent, he cannot walk, cannot talk, cannot feed himself and I wonder if he knows who I am. There are some that say he does. Deterioration since January this year has been rapid. I have had the support of a wonderful Admiral nurse without whom I don't know where I would be. My emotions are all over the place. I feel like I'm grieving, I feel guilt. I hate where he is and feel he should still be home with me but there's no way I could cope. I feel so alone and helpless. I look at him and just cry. Sometimes wonder how much more I can take.
 

AlsoConfused

Registered User
Sep 17, 2010
1,952
0
I so hope you somehow find peace amidst the chaos. You must be a very strong person to have coped over the last 2 years with the frightening deterioration in your husband's abilities and quality of life. I'm sure you've done everything possible to support him and simultaneously meet all the other demands placed on you.
 

LadyA

Registered User
Oct 19, 2009
13,730
0
Ireland
It's a very cruel illness, DeeDee. Your feelings of grief are completely normal. Why wouldn't you grieve? You've lost so much of your husband, your future life together, all your plans and hopes, not to mention watching dementia rob your husband of his abilities. Dementia has been described as an illness where we lose our loved ones twice or three times: First, we "lose" them to the illness. Then, we often lose them to a nursing home, and finally we lose them to death. Each of these losses needs to be grieved.

And then of course there is anticipatory grief, when we know that our loved one is deteriorating, and we know that this is only going to end one way. We wait, and we dread, and a part of us wishes it was just over, for their sake as much as ours. There's a thread on anticipatory grief here: https://forum.alzheimers.org.uk/showthread.php?85774-Anticipatory-Grief