I don’t remember my life before Alzheimer’s disease. I was 7 years old when my 49 year old mother was diagnosed with this horrible disease. I also don’t remember my mom. Alzheimer’s took her from me and replaced her with a scary stranger. She became angry and confused. Sometimes gritting her teeth and  saying, you you. She couldn’t remember who we were but thought we had done something to her. She would some times threaten friends who came to visit and scare them. Telling people there was  a strange man living in the house( her husband my dad) We had to get a special lock on the front door so she couldn’t get out and get lost. She got angry when she couldn’t open the door, pulling on the knob she eventually broke it. As the the disease progressed she became incontinent and unable to bathe herself. My dad took care of her at home as long as he could. When he was no longer able to she went to a nursing home. My dad was there every day and fed her three meals a day until the day she died, two months before my 17th birthday.

This is just a small bit of what my older brothers and I went through as children living with a parent with Alzheimer’s. It really is just to hard to put it into words.

As absolutely awful as it was to see my mother deteriorate from this disease it is so much worse to now watch it happening to my sister.

I pray that a cure is found so that this horrific disease is stopped.