Personal Narrative: A Personal Experience With Alzheimer's Disease

As a teenager in India, I developed an insatiable curiosity for medicine when I took care of my ailing aunt. My only aunt had multiple medical issues since her early twenties. She passed away when she was 53, but I remember her telling me how she had to struggle with diabetes. Since the age of 20 she had repeated miscarriages and stillbirths during her reproductive years. She developed recurrent pulmonary infections and pulmonary edema; unfortunately, a diagnosis wasn’t made until she was very sick. Finally, a diagnosis of Primary Pulmonary Hypertension was made but her prognosis was poor. My aunt who was childless always was fond of me and considered me her child. My bond with my aunt grew strong in her last days on earth. The

My grandfather's dementia had gotten worse with age. He had developed a habit of walking out of the house randomly. They lived alone in their apartment in Pakistan. One day he walked out the same way and did not return for a long time. We were later informed that he had tripped on his way and broke his hip. After surgery my grandmother called me, I was living abroad at that time, and said, "I don't think he will recover, he is in a lot of pain" I assured her otherwise. She said, "I can't live without him. I don’t want him to die." The helplessness and grief in her voice was agonizing. She would often call and cry, it became tough overtime as I was abroad and not fully aware of his progress. I am her oldest grandchild, and she treats me like

One story that is close to my heart is that of my grandfather. He was one of the best men I ever knew; however, he grew up poor and provided his family with food only from his garden and farm. In his late 70s, he died from a heart attack. His heart condition was only worsened by not seeking medical attention. Since he was a poor farmer that lived hours away from a heart specialist, the care he needed could not be attained. This event led me to become even more intrigued with medicine. At this time, I became very close with the director of the emergency room and shadowed him every chance I can get. Throughout my college years, I still love to spend a twelve hour shift with him in the emergency room. With this being said, my motivation to pursue a profession in medicine skyrocketed.

Once an individual is diagnosed and lives with Alzheimer’s disease (AD) , there is the question of what the individuals with the disease are still capable of after much of their cognition is affected. In order to understand the disease further, these two case studies were chosen to understand the effects on the social aspects of individuals suffering from AD. The two case studies explored reveal certain patients with AD, at early to mid-stages of the disease, are possibly capable of preserving their sense of identity, expressing their identity, and responding accordingly to the care and attention they receive.

I was 16 when I learned what it meant to be dead. I had known of it before, but I didn’t really know death -- I was too young to really understand. I didn’t realize how hard it would be to ward off the waves from washing away my grandparents when they were in Mexico, and I was here. We were separated by oceans of land so our contact was limited. And the oceans only got deeper as I realized that Alzheimer's meant something beyond just memory loss. It meant I watched my Abuelito’s glassy eyes lead to an empty attic, and knew I was waiting for a tsunami to take it over like it had the rest of him.

Growing up I was always knew I was going to be great. I always told myself I could be whatever I put I mind to. When I graduated high school I went off to college,Wilberforce University to study communications. I wanted to be a writer for a large magazine and I always envisioned myself living in a big city, New York City to be exact! I had a passion for writing like nobody’s business. So off to college I went. School was great and then life took over so there had to be changes to the agenda.

It was faded red, and slow: on Volkswagen time. Others rushed impatiently. It said, “Speed limit will do. No hurry.”

Comfortably dying, steadily but surely eradicating the remainder of my humanity. Cells dying, dilating then slowly leaking away into the bloodstream. I am dying, I can comprehend the events that are occurring even though I am young. The heart rate monitor has a relaxing drone; which suppresses my depression and continuous tears. How do you accept dying at the age of nine? Oh right, you are not supposed to.

Alzheimer’s affects more than five million Americans and is the sixth-leading cause of death in the United States. One in three seniors dies with Alzheimer’s or another form of dementia, and it causes more deaths than breast cancer and prostate cancer combined (Alzheimer’s Association®, 2016). The number of people with Alzheimer’s grows daily and is expected to continue to increase tremendously over the years to come. So what is Alzheimer’s and what are the effects it has on one’s life?

My family has a dad and a mom, my moms name is Merrilee, and my dads name is Keith. I have two brothers, Alex and Ayden, we live in Lime Spring Iowa, but we used to live in Casper, Wyoming. My friends are Trey Burnikel from school and football, Carter Henry from school and football, and Gabe Grabau from school. We might be getting a new ranger and fourwheeler, but it might be a couple months.

I’m sorry Ms. Wiles for causing your door to creak late into first period my sophomore year. I’m sorry the last three months of second semester I was only ever on time or actually there four times. I wanted to go to your class but I got anxiety thinking about walking in and everyone staring, then you having to redirect everyone's attention. I also didn’t want you to be upset with me. So I just thought showing up the next day wouldn’t be as stressful. At the time I was careless and had this mindset of oh well, I’m late, might as well not show up. Or I’m late might as well be extra late. This is actually my second time writing this apology letter. I never gave you the first one because I just felt awkward giving it to you, but I’ve had more

She received the reply; Lashonda’s hand shook as she held the letter retrieved from the mailbox. What news would it hold? Would she or happy? Either way she would go to college. Other colleges had accepted her and offered full scholarships. Still she wanted a full scholarship to the top rated Trelawny University with the excellent neuroscience program. A scientist at heart and a budding neuroscientist, she yearned to take her place in a laboratory participating in research to find a cure for Alzheimer’s disease. A fourteen-year-old boy had designed a test for pancreatic cancer, why should not she dream.

Darryl: I continued smoking and sexing, it’s a wonder the police never caught me. I frequented places I would have never gone to before using crack. I quickly ran out of money and both my mother and father were sending money to help pay my rent and I was using that to support my habit. I finally came to a moment of clarity that I could not continue on in this manner and I needed help. I contacted both my parents and told them what was happening, neither one of them were happy about hearing that I was addicted to crack. My father sent me a plane ticket to return back to Detroit. After arriving back in Detroit my father had me admitted to an inpatient drug rehab at Henry Ford Hospital. I went through a four-day detox and hospitalization for 28 days. During treatment I was required to attend AA and NA meetings on site, I was given a therapist to help me overcome and face my depression. I attended an outpatient program for over 6 months and attended NA meetings everyday until I was successfully clean for one year. I think my biggest challenge was facing my depression; I had never been to a therapist before because I did not want family and friends to know that I was suffering from mental disorder. I still to this day

High school is a hard experience on its own, but going through it with a mental illness makes it ten times as hard.

When I walked into the bowling alley to conduct interview and explain to Walt my purpose of this assignment, I had no doubt in my mind things would be smooth. I had done several interview before and never had doubts, barriers or skepticism before, during or after. I assumed that getting personal with someone this age would be simple thinking they would be happy to tell what that have done for over seven decades. Upon meeting Walt, I shook his hand and knew he would be somewhat of a challenge per his body language a greeting comment. His greeting to me was, “Evening, life interview huh, I’ll see what all I can tell you. (Gladden. personal communication. November 21, 2017.).” My initial assumption was wrong and I went in thinking this man was going divulge me his personal experience no hesitation because of my professionalism, slight personal connections of interest and military connection.