I’ve noticed friends and family are having a hard time accepting my diagnosis of Major Neurocognitive Disorder (MND). I understand that. Dementia is a terrifying diagnosis. Finding out your memory loss is significant and will only get worse is a nightmare you can’t escape.
Five years ago I was diagnosed with Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI). The memory loss I experienced then has gotten worse. I wander around my house knowing there was something I was looking for but don’t know what or where it is. I just keep moving from room to room hoping something sparks a usable memory. Sometimes it does, sometimes I give up.
But it’s more than just memory loss. It’s looking at an old friend and I can’t remember their name. I get disoriented and don’t know where I am. It’s having a conversation with a friend when suddenly what I was going to say goes away like a puff of smoke. I have no idea what I was talking about. It’s losing my intelligence, one of the few things I’m proud of. I’ve always been extremely smart but now I struggle to learn anything new and memorizing anything is virtually impossible. Battling mental illness for so many years has made me very in tune with what’s happening with my body. I was fortunate to catch this early.
This isn’t easy for me to face so I need friends by my side to listen and empathize. Doubting the diagnosis is not helpful. Minimizing my situation makes me feel alienated and overwhelmed. They minimize what to me is a much greater loss than what they see. I hate feeling alone. It surprises me that few people have reached out to me to see how I’m doing. I told almost everyone in my life but now there’s only crickets. I have my own denial to deal with; I can’t deal with theirs, too.
Photo by Priscilla Du Preez on Unsplash
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