Having Alzheimer’s or Dementia can make you feel “Trapped!” by Norman McNamara

Dementia Can Make You Feel Trapped

Norman McNamara was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s at 50. Since then, he’s spent much of his time sharing his story with others. Because of his dedication to awareness he has enlightened many of us,  caregivers and loved ones alike, about the feelings and emotions that can disturb someone with Alzheimer’s or Dementia. Norm often feels  a sense of being trapped. He explains, “The feeling of being “Trapped” follows me often”– Yet, his wish with this article is to allow us, as loved ones of those with this disease, to experience what he feels.

GUEST POST by Norman McNamara:
Who would have thought with all the places I go, all the things I do and all the people I know that I would ever feel “Trapped” by this horrendous disease–Dementia! Thank you Dementia Demon! NOT!

But this is how I feel at the moment and on some other days. Maybe it’s because I was visited by my Social worker and CPN the other day. I had to sit there and listen to my future being mapped out by someone else: including care, sitters (a bone of serious contention at the moment) and being “Looked After,” like a child. Deep down, somewhere in the depths of my soul is a “Fighter” (metaphorically speaking that is.) I have always been a fighter, and this is the part of me that still resists, at every turn, being cosseted and fussed over. It causes me great  confusion—

• GOD! I don’t want to be affected by this awful disease!
• I don’t want to have dementia!
• I hate this AWFUL DISEASE with such a vengeance it consumes my every thought sometimes!

But, I also wonder if this disease is what drives me to keep fighting? Fighting for myself and others who are affected by this disease, so that one day we will all see a cure.

Did I have to get this awful disease before I could realize what little help those affected by dementia really get? I wonder.

Did I have to get this awful disease to feel guilty enough because I hadn’t helped more before I was diagnosed!

I’m “Trapped” by these questions and the confusion they create in my own thoughts.
Now I REALLY HATE THIS DISEASE!!!

This is my confusion. I accept that. But over and over I am “trapped,” by these confused thoughts. My thoughts are very confusing sometimes.

A million questions with no answers! “Trapped” by a multitude of questions. Questions that invade “My Space” as they say, and linger until I finally drop off to sleep at night.  Then haunted by images and places of my past with devastating affects to my “Angel’s” (Elaine-wife) sleep pattern as well as my own. And so it goes on and on and on!

But! The fighter I mentioned earlier is still there, he is shouting from the deepest depths of my mind that this will pass and all will be well very soon. As long as I am able to, I promise I will always listen and wait for the calmer moments when I am no longer “trapped in confusion.”
Norman

Author: Norman McNamara— Many of you know Norman McNamara, as a friend from Facebook and Memory People. At 50 yrs old Norm was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s. He is now 53 yrs old and spends much of his time sharing his story with others. As an advocate he’s helped many others with his  posts and poetry and fine writing. Norman McNamara can be found on Facebook, at many “memory cafe’s” in the UK, and as an Author of two books about his trials and tribulations as he fights the battle of his life.
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