ALZHEIMER'S BLOGGING:

Good Sunday to you all. I am sitting at work, waiting for a call of help, so I can come out in my ambulance and take care of someone in need.  Sometimes my mind wonders back to when my father in law was alive.  I miss him terribly. He was a good man, a gentle man, and taught me so much about love and kindness. 

I will admit it is not always a fun job taking care of a person with Alzheimer's.  It is a 24hr/7day a week job.  It is like taking care of a baby, you can't let the person out of your site. One of the things that  helped me was remembering the kind of man he was before the disease took over his mind. When he would be mean or silly, I would remind myself who he really was and smile and just be so glad that I was the one who got to take care of him.

I did put my father in law in an adult day care which at first started out 2 days a week for four hours just so that I could get some sleep. I was working the midnight shift two days a week and I needed to rest when I got home. So I would give him breakfast, drop him off at the day care and hurry to bed for  some sound sleep for a few hours before I picked him up. I found out later that it was not enough. I needed more time to myself. I was always tense keeping an eye on  him all the time. I even had a baby monitor on in his room, so that I could keep an eye on him when I was sleeping. So I decided to put him in the day care 5 days a week for four hours a day. It was amazing how much better I felt.  The  three days I didn't work, I got to do house work, or just enjoy the after noon with my family or friends. I sometimes went down town Chicago to goof off for a while. The four hrs of no stress was amazing for my health and my moods. I was actually so happy to get him again and ready for my watch.

Remember you are not alone. There are many resources out there to help you. Try to think back to the person they were before the disease hit them. They did not ask for the disease. So don't punish them even more, isn't the disease punish enough? 

Adult Day Care Can Do More Than Medicine:
http://alzheimersweekly.com/content/adult-day-care-can-do-more-medicine
This is something I found  on Alzheimer's Weekly on line Magazine.

Sincerely,
Marie Fostino
Alzheimer's A Caretakers Journal
Seaboard Press An Imprint of James A Rock Pub., Co.
http://www.mariefostino.com/
http://www.mariefostino.blogspot.com/