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Adamsky Law Offices Life & Estate Planning ♦ Elder Law |
Serving Massachusetts and
New Hampshire since 1992.
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To read a review of “The Forgetting – Alzheimer’s: Portrait of an Epidemic” By David Shenk Click Here |
To read a review of Who Cares: A Loving Guide for My Future Caregivers By Dee Marrella Click Here |
"Who Cares: A Loving Guide for My Future Caregivers"
By Dee Marrella
Review By Atty. Edward H. Adamsky
This book is a guide and an outline, that helps you to tell your family all of those things that you should tell them. The author guides you through the process of putting down in writing the facts, opinions, and information, that we all wish we knew about our loved-ones. You can complete the exercises for yourself or buy this book for your elder, and help them fill in the information. The knowledge gained from this resource will be a precious treasure for generations. You may want a copy for every member of your family.
“The Forgetting – Alzheimer’s: Portrait of an Epidemic”
By David Shenk
Review By Atty. Edward H. Adamsky
Dr. Alzheimer was the first to carefully examine the brain of a dementia sufferer. The emerging field of optics allowed him to see the plaques and tangles in the brain. The progress of the disease is sinister, fascinating, and horribly frightening. Although scientists feel close to understanding the process, they don’t know why it starts, and cures may be close at hand, or maddeningly far away.
Our memories are stored carefully in the pathways between our neurons. The linking of these paths is complex and beyond our current understanding, but it is clear these paths contain what is “us.” Alzheimer’s breaks down these pathways with plaques, and clutters up the neurons with tangles. It is slow, taking many years to even show damage, but relentless, ultimately taking away the entire function of the brain and causing death. What is so frightening is that it takes so long to work its deadly way through our brains. Those afflicted with the disease are well aware of it at first, and well aware that they will lose that awareness long before they lose the battle.
The author hopes that readers will understand the special burdens of this disease. Currently about 5 million Americans have Alzheimer’s and their cost of care is about $100 billion a year. Those numbers may seem small in the near future, when the Baby Boom generation reaches age 65 and beyond. Shenk implores his readers to speak out and urge their representatives to seek more funding for research and care.
Although The Forgetting presents the fear and mystery of Alzheimer’s Disease, and hints at a solution, medical science has yet to provide it. Aging and memory loss will remain related for the foreseeable future. We can only understand the disease, and learn how to live with its inevitable course. Reading The Forgetting, will make you feel more knowledgeable and less afraid of a disease that has always been a part of the human experience.
Alzheimer’s Disease is an insidious, ultimately fatal condition characterized by “plaques” and “tangles” that obliterate neurons and impede brain function. The disease can take as few as five and as many as twenty years to destroy a brain. During this time a patient will, at first, know what is happening, and live in fear of the horror ahead. Towards the end, the patient will, with luck, live in a blissful state of forgetfulness, while the family around the patient will suffer the loss of their loved-one stretched out over years of agony.
The Forgetting is a beautiful portrait of an ugly thing. The scientific descriptions are fascinating and educational. The personal notes are enlightening and touching. Readers will learn the process of the disease, while achieving empathy for those who are coping with it. This book is an invaluable tool for everyone who comes into contact with families touched by Alzheimer’s.
The Forgetting begins with a look at the history of the disease, including how it got its name (from Dr. Alois Alzheimer who first differentiated it from senile dementia in 1901) and how it seems to work its damage to the brain. The author paints his portrait by shifting between dry science and the personal experiences of Alzheimer’s patients. Shenk reassuringly details historical references to the disease (Ralph Waldo Emerson, Jonathan Swift, Shakespeare, Euripides, Chaucer, and others), thus showing it is not a modern-day malady, but something human-kind has long endured. We are only seeing more of it today, because medical science has eradicated many of the diseases that killed us long before Alzheimer’s could do its deadly damage to our brains.
Although forgetting and aging seem synonymous, it is not inevitable. Many people live to great ages without memory loss. On the other hand, Alzheimer’s disease is destined in some, and will inflict them as they age, from a one percent rate at age 65 to thirteen percent at age 77, and nearing fifty percent by age 85. Our own evolutionary mandates are at fault. Age related memory loss does not affect humans until well after the time they have had children and perpetuated their genetic material. Our brains helped humans survive and prosper, but the propensity for Alzheimer’s played no part in our natural selection.
Edward H. Adamsky, Attorney At Law ♦ Licensed in Massachusetts and New Hampshire ♦ 269 Middlesex Road, Tyngsboro, MA 01879 978-649-6477