Today is my father's birthday, 82 today I believe... "one less than the year" as he always used to say, meaning 2013 so one less than the year ... 82. Not logical to most but now I understand it. The good news is Dad enjoys going out for his BD, so we buy restaurant gift cards. While he did not use to want to go out much, now he does and that is good since we want him to stay social.

The next subject is less appetizing:  Aunt Joan. It was on Mother's Day a few years ago when she died from whatever veteran Alzheimer's patients die from. It all started when she was 56, not even retirement age. Aunt Joan the math teacher could no longer find her classroom; she seemed lost in the school she taught in for many years.

Joan get cheated  out of her full retirement in my opinion. And in the nunnery, where she served for many years, and did not contribute anything to her retirement despite her years of admirable service. This is of course another issue for another time.

She lived quite  a few years after the diagnosis. First Joan lived at home with part time care. Later, full time live in caretaker. Then Dad had to move her into "assisted living." Joan hated it at first, and demanded that we get her out of there. We would take Joan to the park and she would beg me to take her back to her home (which of course had to be sold to pay for assisted living). After three summers in assisted living, Joan barely recognized us. My last memory of her was when we went to get her to take her to the park, and she basically said, "I have to stay here and take care of my husband." Of course she never had a husband, and was actually holding the hand of some elderly woman.

I tried buying her books early on--but she never read them and probably could not. I wonder now if research should focus on a kind of cognitive therapy for Alzheimer patients. So much of the research money is sucked up with caretaker research. Forget the caretakers; the Alzheimer patience is the one who needs the most help.

Back to Dad, he was not diagnoised until he was in his late seventies, not late fifties like Aunt Joan. So that is a good thing. This does not change the fact that we, the younger generation, could get "early onset" Alzheimers. Sometimes, I wonder about my short term memory... now.

First tribal discussions about Alzheimer's.

I remember the first discussions about quality of versus quantity of life, but more I recall the debates about mental versus physical deabilitation. This was in the late 1970s. Uncle George argued vehemently--as he did with almost all his pet topics and by God there were many--that after watching his mother-in-law stare at the wall, sometimes for hours--that he preferred to be in a wheel chair but still have his mental faculties. We young ones hated the thought of being in a wheel chair and probably argued to the contrary.

Unfortuately, Uncle George died at 62 of a massive heart attack, so we  had to continue the above debates without the pleasure of his great rhetorical skills. In fact for many years the family debates simply ended because of the void left by Uncle George.

Yet, there would be much reason for the debate to continue.