Tuesday, June 5, 2018

He's Describing Me

Last week my friend, Penny, asked me if I was still seeing Facebook postings from my old friend, Jim McWhinnie.  While I haven't seen Jim in a few decades, Penny knows that his postings the last few years documenting his slide into Alzheimer's disease have been deeply meaningful to me, as well as so many others who've known this brilliant, deeply spiritual, minister over the years.

I told her that he did post occasionally but that his days of sharing real time wisdom about his journey with The Grey Lady (his name for this disease) are probably over.

And then that very day Jim posted what, to me, was an astounding report on his condition.  Here is a small portion of it.

One on one I am more comfortable than I am with two or three or four.  In a crowd, when I sometimes get a bit frantic, simply give me a reassuring look.  That usually calms me down. I do better these days in  low sensory experiences.  The music seems louder than once it did:  flashing lights and loud noises startle me, and jumbled conversations of many voices unnerve me and I feel like fleeing to a quieter place.  

The main reason the above is so special to me is selfish.  It accurately states the way I often feel with this weird Meniere's Disease.  I'm on a website with other sufferers world wide and Jim's descriptions  here of the world from his Alzheimer's view express the same symptoms as our collective Meniere's view.

Of course, it's not the same.  Meniere's is manageable and not life threatening.  But Jim's words remind all of us that our perceptions of the world change dramatically as we deal with the various changes in our aging heads.


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