As many of you know from time to time I share emails with permission. This is one I got just recently. You all seem to be amazed that even advancing in this fricken disease I can still communicate. I want you to know that all of us with AD or other forms of dementia are not always stumbling, bumbling and drooling people. Some to the end, not many still reamin mentally strong, maybe not physically but one cannot have everything. Also this email may give you a hint of why I take no meds for AD, just mood stabilizers, the shit does not work if that helps.**************
Dear Joe and Lynn,
Thank you again for your response...these letters and blogs must keep you both very busy...I don't know how Joe still does it, but thank you from the bottom of my heart. My father suffered from AD silently...we did not know what he was thinking or feeling...he tried to live life as if he didn't have the disease, including not talking about it. The only glimpses we had were his physical struggles, his hallucinations, and listening to his frustrations...we had to try to fill in ourselves what was going on in his head. Joe, you have no idea how much your shared words help us understand what you are feeling or experiencing or thinking...more than you know. I wish my father could have expressed what he was experiencing, but he didn't, so I am learning from you.
I just checked into your blog...I am sorry to say that I haven't been able to keep up with it regularly (due to restricted internet access), but every time I visit your page, it brings tears to my eyes...I am just filled up with sentimental emotion on how much you share, and your struggles doing it, and your struggles with the disease...thank you for all the work you put in. I am amazed at how articulate you still are at this stage.
I am so happy you published a book!!!! That's great.
I unfortunately could not find the memorial link on your page...I must be overlooking it. But I would love to send you the information on my father, and a photo. I will let my mother know.
I was also thrilled to hear that you are doing the Memory walk in Oceanside. Before I knew that, I was going to e-mail and ask if you and/or your family if you and they might be interested because I want to do it too. But I have to get my butt in gear to sign up and send out the e-mails. My mother did the walk in Florida about a week or two ago. I'll honor my father with a team bearing his name; however, I do not have family here, so unless friends join me (and they might), I might be a team of one. I would be honored to walk with you and Lynn if you like. It sounds like you might not have many walking with you, so if you and Lynn need any help at all, I would be happy and honored to help. I helped give care to my father until he passed.
This is getting long for you to read, so I will sign off. If you want to put any of this last response on your blog, you have my permission.
God bless you all (and my father would have agreed with Joe on "...and this great country of ours")
Cheryl
________________________________
God Bless & Keep You & This Country of Ours!!!
joe
PS Cheryl has no real idea what emails and comments from you folks really mean to me. They keep me wanting to post, even though I feel no one really gives a shit.
