Sometimes Grandpa does or says things that make me wonder how his mind works under the affects of Alzhiemer’s. Other times he says or does things which makes me think I can understand some glimmer of how his mind works. I think, to a large degree, Alzhiemer’s twists and exaggerates quirks and flaws that are present in all of our thinking so that the person who carefully observes can see echoes and reflections of themselves in the Alzhiemer’s patient.
As one small example, all of us find our minds wandering on occassion. Some of us are more prone to wandering thoughts than others, but opposed to our normal sometime problems with keeping our minds focused and our attention fixed, an Alzhiemer’s paitent is fixed in this state most of the time. Things are quickly forgotten and information is retained with difficulty as the mind constantly wanders off and is distracted by intruding thoughts.
Grandpa often sits silently on the couch, sometimes seeming to doze and other times simply sitting there. I suspect that at those times his mind wanders from one thought to another, drifting along in that way you may have occassionally done daydreaming as a child, only to come back to the present and realize an hour or more has passed. As a healthy child or adult you usually day dream about past events, future plans, or imaginary adventures. But what thoughts to an Alzhiemer’s patient mind wander through?
I don’t think there is one simple little answer to that question. Probably Grandpa’s mind sometimes wanders through memories of the past, concerns of the present, or thoughts about the future. But some times I think he thoughts might simply wander, perhaps unconciously seeking out things forgotten. He will sometimes ask questions out-of-the-blue about things. A common subject is the meaning of words. So far they have been unusual words that I think he once knew the meaning of, but now only retains the memory of the word without the meaning.
“What is a hedonist?” he asks one night when he is lying on the couch.
“What does occlusion mean?” he asks after supper one day.
Then one day recently he said something I found particular telling. It was around lunch time and Melinda, Grandpa, and myself were sitting around the kitchen table. Suddenly Grandpa spoke up.
“I sit there and I think and I think,” he said. “I think until I think I’ve finally got it all thought out. Then I think Earwig and I don’t know what that means.”
It was a very odd thought to come out of nowhere, but I explained to him that an Earwig was the name for a type of bug, and tried to explain what the bug looked like. Grandpa didn’t seem to have any recognition of the bug I discribed (though I’m sure he has seen them many times during his life and once did know they were called Earwig’s) and seemed to lose interest.
His mind was probably already wandering off again.
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