This came in an email from one of my other support groups. This man named Richard has dementia and is teahing us to look at the person not the disease. I thought this would be good for all caregivers. Any disease that you mention to people seem to make them scarce and then the caregivers are all alone and become overwhelmed. I know that I personally have decided to see my husband and not the disease. He is still the wonderful man I married. I am getting the opportunity of mininstering to him as I would minister to Jesus. I still cry from time to time which is only natural but it is not evertaking me as it was before. I am overcoming everyday and that is so rewarding. Hugs & Blessings

It is always startling to me when someone I know, even if only through
some make believe roles in make believe movies, dies and has been
prior to her/his death living with a diagnosis of Dementia , probably
of this or that type.

Someone found the press release Mr. Heston read announcing his
diagnosis, and I just read it. Reading Charleton Heston's
announcement that he had been diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease
reconfirms for me that many, too many individuals, even those
diagnosed with the disease see the diagnosis as the start of a long
good bye.

We announce and prepare ourselves and others to the fact that we have
already started to fade away. It started the moment someone in a white
coat told us "You have Dementia, probably of this or that type, and
certainly with these features." I'm on my way out! It's all downhill
from here! Don't look for me anymore; I'm going to be busy fading away
and not being me.

We are seldom seen post diagnosis. We seldom speak up or speak out
post diagnosis. After all we are fading away. What could we have
worthwhile to say? Could we possible grow as a human being after we
have been diagnosed? We become someone we would be embarrassed to be
were we capable of appreciating who we had become!
Are we? Will be embarrassed for ourselves? Who is embarrassed for
whom? How do you know I'm not accepting, perhaps even contented with
who I am today. Even if I'm sometimes frustrated. Even if I'm
sometimes agitated. I'm still me!

Isn't it time others who don't live with the diagnosis focus their
energies on understanding, appreciating, supporting, enabling those of
us who do live with diagnosis? Don't concentrate on who we were? Don't
try to convince us we should hang on to yesterday, or last year, or
fifty years ago when we are struggling to understand today.!?
Wouldn't it be easier to love someone we believed was a whole person,
instead of someone half empty? Instead of someone who is literally a
shell of who they were?

Is it any wonder people find us hard to love when they find us so hard
to understand? to appreciate for who we are? to accept our changes,
our symptoms, our forgetting and confusion. Of course it is. Some
people with dementia and many caregivers keep saying good-bye. I, and
I honestly believe every other person living with and in dementia need
to hear, feel, and be supported by saying "Hello!"

This is not an issue just for those in the late stage of the disease,
nor just for those in the mid stage of the disease. It starts the day
the diagnosis is pronounced. Collectively, and individually we need to
find the courage, the support, the understanding to say hello to
ourselves and each other.

Every day! Every day! It's that simple! It's that easy! Reduce stress,
increase love you give and receive, enjoy and live in today.

"Hello"

Richard