Читать книгу Alzheimer's Timeline - Brian Bailie - Страница 5

Very Mild Cognitive decline

Subjective complaints of memory deficit, most frequently in the following areas:

(a)forgetting where one has placed familiar objects;

(b)forgetting names one formerly knew well.

No objective evidence of memory deficit on clinical interview. No objective deficits in employment or social situations. Appropriate concern with respect to symptomatology.

Global Deterioration Scale © Barry Reisberg, MD

But everyone does this (don’t they?). I frequently forget the name of my dog, (one reason why I’ve trained it to come to my whistle). And of course I know the names of my own children, but occasionally, mid-sentence, I might refer to them with another familiar name. It’s frustrating for me, and it’s annoying for my child; but is this dementia? Of course it isn’t, it’s just normal. Everyone does it.

You mean to tell me that you’ve never gone to get something, walked into a room to get it, and stood there like an eejit trying to remember why you’re there and what you’re looking for? We all do stuff like this. It’s called being relaxed; your brain is on stand-by, we’re just mentally freewheeling (aren’t we?). I think that what the Global Deterioration Scale wants to emphasise is that this kind of forgetfulness is a symptom of Stage 2, however it’s also a symptom of being a relaxed, perfectly healthy human being.

To put this into the context of my mum’s early symptoms, no one noticed anything, because as I’ve already described her, she had always been dippy, scatty, and disorganised. And with Dad beginning to suffer from ill health, Mum was bound to be worried, I never thought twice about her being a little more disorganised or more forgetful than usual.