Alzheimer’s disease (AD) affects everyone involved: the victim and his/her’s loved ones. First of all, caregivers are often overlooked, and never realized for what sacrifices they give up to care for their loved one. Secondly, the financial burden of caring for someone with Alzheimer’s is a big job that can hurt the opportunities that needed more time to get a better degree. Thirdly, although the victim of Alzheimer’s disease is the ill one, usually, they aren’t the only one suffering from this terrible disease. People must know that the caregivers are fighting just as much as the victim of the disease. Caring for someone with Alzheimer’s disease isn’t easy. It is always difficult for the family and victim to accept that they have Alzheimer’s …show more content…
Caregivers often feel guilty because they feel that they caused the disease, losing your temper, or feeling like you don’t want to care for him/her. Also, you might feel guilty for making a promise that couldn’t have been kept. Another feeling you might feel is grief and loss. This can occur because you feel that a loved one has been lost, everything won’t be the same again, and all of your plans together cannot be done due to Alzheimer’s. Anger is another emotion that can occur due to Alzheimer’s disease. A person might feel this way because it seems to them that they are the only one who cares or could be mad at the person with Alzheimer’s for being non-cooperative and the medical staff for not making things better. What people always forget to do in this situation is check on the kids to make sure they understand. For kids, they feel scared because they did something to cause Alzheimer’s or can catch it from them, they can confused about what is happening, and . Also, with teenagers, they might feel embarrassed that their loved one is different from other people. The best way to deal with Alzheimer’s is to be in contact with family, have everyone aware, and always work
“Alzheimer`s disease is called a family disease” (ALZlive), because it impacts every family member who is slowly watching a loved one decline. Alzheimer’s disease has an impact on caretakers because caregivers can lead to a variety of emotions, from guilt to anger. When dealing with a client who has Alzheimer; caretakers have a huge responsibility, which can cause stress or depression. If the caretaking is a family member it might lead to finical problems, which can lead to the hard and controversial decision of putting someone in a nursing home, that is better equipped. Guilt is the main emotion that a caretaker can express “I have never spoken to my mother`s doctor, it occurs to me that other children of
When it comes to Alzheimer’s, I know firsthand how it affects individuals and their families. My great grandfather had Alzheimer’s for many years before his passing late last year, at age 92. Alzheimer’s is a disease that many individuals suffer with each year, but yet with all the advancements in modern medicine we still have no cure for it. There are different ways to conquer this disease, understanding the causes, knowing effects, and researching possible treatments.
Caring for patients with Alzheimer’s disease is a difficult job, but someone has to care for these unfortunate people. It takes a lot of love and compassion to care for patients with this disease. There is a certain type of knowledge and understanding to work with patients with this disease and it requires someone willing to learn and help care for patients that have it. In the long run, some patients may experience a prolonged and happier life with the right type of interventions in place.
Family/friends: when an individual is given a diagnosis of dementia it impacts on their friends and family too, they may feel angry or guilty but may also have an overwhelming fear of what they can do to support the sufferer and each other at present and in the future. Will they be able to cope with the level of commitment to the individuals needs on top of their own daily trials? Not to mention the added financial/emotional stress. Support services are available for care givers alongside the person suffering with dementia via Gp, social services or online forums.
It is inevitable that eventually each of us will grow old and begin to face more and more health problems as our age rises. Elderly people are challenged by many illnesses and diseases that unfortunately, are incurable. One disease that becomes more common as people age is Alzheimer’s disease. Alzheimer’s a common cause and a form of dementia and can severely damage a patient’s cognitive functions and can ultimately cause death. Living with Alzheimer’s disease can be saddening for both the sufferer and the family. Family and friends will find it very hard to cope when a loved one begins slipping away and losing memory of who they are.
Dementia is an extremely common disease among the elderly, with 4 million Americans currently suffering from the Alzheimer’s type alone. Figures show that 3% of people between the ages of 65-74 suffer from the disease, rapidly increasing to 19% for the 75-84 age bracket, and as high as 47% for the over 85s. Therefore, it is easy to see why Dementia is such a large part of many people’s lives, whether they are suffering from the condition themselves, or have an elderly relative who requires full time care just to undertake simple day to day tasks. The disease can be extremely traumatic for the patient and their families, as the person, who may have been extremely lively and bright throughout their
A major issue for caregivers is that neither the patient nor the caregiver can pinpoint the exact symptoms of the disease. For instance, the patient will experience common lapses in memory and thus will not be able to carry out the everyday tasks like he used to. As stated earlier, many caregivers overlook these mild signs and do not realize that the disease is present until it gets worse.It should also be noted that many people fear the fact that they might have dementia. The people who have remarkable social skills therefore are very well at hiding their memory loss. (Powers, 2003) Being fearful about one's situation can cause restlessness and feeling of despair. If the caregivers are too blunt about the disease, the patient can even go on to commit suicide because of his condition.
One of my main questions was whether I could do anything emotionally to cope with Alzheimer’s and with that search I had better luck. One of my favorite pieces of information I found was to face your feelings head on “think of all emotions...positive and negative...be as sad as you want...work through anger and frustration...these are healthy feelings...it’s common to feel love and anger at the same time” Taken from a paper published on (“Alzheimer’s Association website”). The next thing I found that helped me personally was how to deal with guilt, personally I’ve experienced feeling guilty when taking a break or not being there for my grandma when she needed me, as well as regretting things I had done before knowing about the illness. Something interesting I found that I would’ve never thought of was to continue to participate in as many activities as possible.(“Alzheimer’s Association” pg. ) I also found that a good way to keep an emotional connection longer is to personally connect with the sufferer. A few ways to do that is to keep eye contact with throughout the conversation, to always refer to them by name when talking, continue the conversation as long as possible because is makes the person with AD feel better about themselves, and be aware of the body language you’re presenting (“Grief and loss as Alzheimer’s progresses” pg. ). I would say the most essential piece of information I learned was the best thing I can do is just comfort the person with AD and make their time left as easy as
Various things that alzheimer’s patients do can be frustrating to caregivers when they don’t understand what is going through the patient’s head. In public, things can be overwhelming and sometimes embarrassing for a caregiver and they can become angry. Sometimes, the caregiver becomes angry and starts to be overbearing on the patient because they develop frustration. This is a point in time where caregivers frequently decide that it is a good idea to send their loved one to a facility that can better manage the disease (Callone,
I was not aware that Alzheimer’s was a disease that can affect members of the same family. This disease can be proceeding in an inconspicuous or harmless way but can have a grave effect. The person may think it’s normal to have forgetful moments but shouldn’t be taken for granted. Due to aging and the things that come with normal aging this disease can be imitating. As an adult a person being independent and having to depend on someone can be daunting crush to their ego to ask for assistance. The person diagnosed with the disease can be proactive and come to terms on how this cam impact one’s family and friends. I was not aware of the many affects it can have upon a person such as thinking, judgment, problem solving, language skills, and personality and movement abilities. The disease is a process and can be scary in coming to terms with. Researchers know a lot about the disease and think it can be beat. Due to modern technology and science medicines they have made tremendously progress. The dying nerve cell, the loss of memory and the thinking ability to perform with this disease may not be cured but great process has been made to see inside the brain for the
In the pamphlet Basics of Alzheimer’s Disease, the Alzheimer’s Association adds late onset, traditionally known simply as Alzheimer’s, targets primarily people 65 and older. The disease follows a series of steps from mild decline with little noticed changes to very severe cognitive decline where the final stage of the disease is in progress (Basic 19-21). Throughout the stages, independence becomes lost and family members will become care takers and in the later stages nursing homes or hospice may be needed. One book encourages the care giver to communicate through body language, tone, and written instructions to help alleviate as much stress as possible for those living with Alzheimer’s (Living 47). The book further adds when caring for a person with Alzheimer’s remember to maintain patience and to show respect .
Alzheimer’s disease (AD) can be a devastating disease for patient and families, the patient would need 24-hour care and they would become dependent on their families. I used to take care off a lady with AD at a facility. The facility had several room, one for people with early signs of AD where the patients were still doing ADL’s on their own and another where patients needed total care. My client
After Alzheimer's is diagnosed in a parent, or other elderly family member, the caregiver has the task of deciding what the best form of care for the patient is. In order to do this they have to fully understand what the disease is, and
One day it was all normal, my mom my brother and I were visiting them just as usual, there was my great uncle in the kitchen working on some lunch for us, and there was my amazing great aunt, being happy and full of joy and life as usual! She would be helping me with my spanish, and playing fun games with me as well. Then when she got alzheimer’s everything changed. She whispered and you could never hear her. All she was trying to do was try to remember who was who and what was what. She would walk around with sorrow in her eye’s and you could feel how much she was trying to do. I remember one day we were all out on the patio and then all of a sudden my great aunt started to cry, but the thing is we didn’t know what was wrong, my great uncle went up to her and tried to calm her down. Then he said, “She wants to know what is hers and what is not, she feels like she knows but she just can’t remember.”, I could see that my great uncle was trying to keep it happy, but I could feel the pain that he was going through, just imagine one of the people you love going through alzheimer’s and you can’t do anything absolutely anything except watch and hope. Although she had alzheimer’s, I still had hope for her, I knew that she wasn’t going to go anywhere... With this, I want to tell you how to help the people living with someone with
Patients with Alzheimer's disease are better living in a nursing home than with family members. Throughout the years there's millions of adults between the age of 65 and up , but in some cases, they develop the symptoms at a younger age. Alzheimer’s is a disease which disrupts the thought, memory of people making them forget certain things . In some cases there’s a high percentage that Alzheimer patients have hurt themselves or a family member. If they think about the family of the patients can see that having them in a nursing home can prevent tragic things from happening . Although a certain amount of people are against it placing family members in a nursing because they think that they’re better off living with them and they save money .