Running from Alzheimer’s

At 53, I am running from alzheimer’s or I am running to keep from getting alzheimer’s. I don’t think there is any evidence that this works but it helps me. I am not sure I can run fast enough, though.

My maternal grandfather had early onset alzheimer’s. I don’t know his exact age when it started. My mom died when I was 13. She was 44 so I don’t know if she would have had alzheimer’s. By the time my mom died, my grampa’s alzheimer’s was bad. He was my favorite and I struggled to watch him decline without being able to help. At first, he would repeat himself. Then he would read entire articles from Reader’s Digest out loud over and over. It was impossible to tell him that he had just read me that article as he was so kind and gentle and I didn’t want to hurt his feelings. He then got very quiet as he knew he was forgetful and he didn’t want to be. That was a very sad time. The entire journey was. I know that this was over the course of about 5+ years. He then got ‘stuck’ in a time period many years prior. He’d look for his horse in the garage saying he’d parked it there and now he couldn’t find it. I was spending a week at a time with my grandparents to help my gramma. We just had to laugh. My gramma said that helped as otherwise she felt she was going crazy. There were many ‘funny’ stories but they were difficult for my gramma. She hung on as long as she could and eventually he had to be moved to a nursing home. I never visited him there. I did not want that to be my last memory of him. I know that’s a cop out but that’s what I did.

So now I occasionally feel I am getting alzheimer’s. I can’t remember names. I have never been good with names but now they are just gone. An elderly friend told me that if I remembered the name within 2 months unprompted then I didn’t have alzheimer’s. I’m hanging on to that ‘fact’!

Fearing I am getting a disease forces me to look online for symptoms, cures and information. The peanut butter test is one I have done. Here is the information:

Linking Sense of Smell to Alzheimer’s

Researchers at The University of Florida asked over 90 participants to smell a spoonful of peanut butter at a short distance from their nose. Some participants had a confirmed early stage Alzheimer’s diagnosis, some had other forms of dementia, while others had no cognitive or neurological problems.

Of those participants, only those with a confirmed diagnosis of early stage Alzheimer’s had trouble smelling the peanut butter. Additionally, those patients also had a harder time smelling the peanut butter with their left nostril. Generally, the right nostril was able to smell the peanut butter 10 centimeters farther away than the left nostril. The difference in smell between left and right nostril in unique to the disease.

Sense of smell is often the first sense to go in cognitive decline, even before memory loss, which is why this could be an effective tool in the fight against Alzheimer’s.

http://www.alzheimers.net/2014-09-19/peanut-butter-test-predicts-alzheimers/

I can still smell peanut butter!!