My father-in-law was formally diagnosed with dementia about 2 months ago. He could have been diagnosed earlier, before it was so obvious, but a lifelong distrust of doctors and a strong stubborn streak meant no one could convince him to see his doctor.
How do you make a full-grown man go see his doctor when he doesn’t want to go? Would an earlier diagnosis have made any difference? Might the meds have held off his decline? Might it have allowed family members more time to prepare?
My wife and I last visited my in-laws about a year and a half ago. They live on the other side of the country and various things conspired to keep us away for a few years before that. When we arrived, my wife’s mom asked us to let her know what we thought about her husband’s mental capacity.
After the first day, he seemed mostly fine — coherent, appropriate, maybe isolating himself a bit, but that wasn’t particularly odd.
A couple of days into the trip had us witnessing more troubling behaviors — uncertainty about where to turn when driving in a familiar neighboring town, not quite tracking conversations, and obsessing about a check that he was expecting in the mail.
By the last day, it was clear he needed to be evaluated by a doctor. He kept wandering off into other tour groups during a visit to…
