“Embracing the Moment: An Alzheimer’s Memoir,” by Barbara Pursley, BookSurge, Charleston, NC, 187 pages, $20.
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As we age, our amazingly complex bodily functions change. Some of us develop arthritis or other bone disorders; others have aches and pains, which are treatable permitting us to live relatively normal lives.
Others of us aren’t that lucky. One out of 35 will develop dementia. Dementia isn’t a specific disease.
It is a group of symptoms effecting intellectual functions, memory loss and social skills severe enough to interfere with everyday functioning.
Dementia is caused by changes in the brain, which in turn are caused by different conditions.
The most common of the dementias, and perhaps the most dreaded, is Alzheimer’s disease.
It has different causes; with early diagnosis in some cases, the progression of disease can be slowed. There is no known one cause — there is no known cure.
In this type of dementia, the cells of the brain are so altered that they eventually cease to function. As the disease progresses, more brain cells die in areas of the brain and eventually the individual dies.
The diagnosis is made by a physician from a series of tests. It’s frightening for the patient. It means devastating changes for family members, relatives, neighbors and even for medical personnel.
In “Embracing the Moment: An Alzheimer’s Memoir,” author, Barbara Pursley, photographer and daughter of Bonnie Nations-Pursley, diagnosed with the disease in 1993, opens to readers her 10-year encounter with the disease that eventually claimed her mother’s life.
The disease also would change her brother’s and her life forever.
Written in journal format, we read her entries, letters written to God and her dead father, and wished for letters of understanding and encouragement from them in response.
Daily entries encompass the spectrum of human emotions. They also describe helpful nonverbal techniques learned in an Alzheimer’s support group to cope more effectively with her mother’s mood swings, anger and other behavioral changes.
The chapters address issues that come up as the disease progresses — reactions to the diagnosis, decisions about care, placement, hospitalizations, declining function, adjusting to life span projections, making final preparations.
Throughout the journal we join the two on excursions shopping and other special times.
Dispersed throughout the book are black and white pictures we view from a different perspective, the progression of the disease, while enabling us to share in fun times with the family.
The author has organized the book well. At the end of the book, she has placed appendices with resource agencies as well as other helpful information.
I have read many books on dementia and Alzheimer’s and have given presentations to hospice caregivers. I wish I’d had this book as a resource.
My hope is that every person 40 years and older would read it. It’s not an easy book to read; it’s intense, especially if you have a family member with a form of dementia as I do.
It’s best to have a large box of tissues nearby. I’ve learned a great deal from it. If I had its insights earlier, I would not have reacted as I did during some incidents with my mom. Other times, I responded well.
Perhaps the most helpful aspect of the book is I have more ideas to provide support for my twin sister. She is the primary caregiver, who is this very weekend, moving mom to another assisted living facility, a new one with Level V care and with a dementia wing.
It’s a book every library should have, both public and religious. Clergy, rabbis and medical personnel will benefit from reading it. Classes in college for medically related occupations and medical schools would benefit from having it as required reading.
With an estimate of 30 million baby boomers projected to develop the condition, we need to know the signs and seek help.
Once diagnosed, we need to be prepared to cope with a disease in which loved ones will eventually need 24 hours of care each day, seven days a week, while at the same time enjoy the treasured moments when they come by embracing the moment.
Margaret Barno, a retired social worker, lives in Pflugerville.
