It’s usually pretty obvious when a person has advanced Alzheimer’s. They don’t remember things, can’t recognize people… But what about the early stage? Is there a way to detect Alzheimer’s disease early on?
1. Getting lost in familiar places
This can be one sign of early Alzheimer’s. They may get lost in the supermarket or at the street around their house.
That’s a red flag: when it happens in a familiar place, somewhere they have been to hundreds of times, like the supermarket, grocery store, the mall, their neighborhood…
If you get lost in a new place that’s a different story, not so significant. Everybody can get lost in a new place, but why would you get lost 100 feet from your house? It’s sometimes a sign that something is off.
2. Not finding the right words
You know that feeling when you want to say something but the word won’t come out? Like it’s on the tip of you tongue but you can’t say it?
Well, that happens to all of us, so don’t worry.
However, if it happens very often and with very common words–like dog, car, drink….– then it may not be so normal.
Also, it’s quite typical that they forget the names of close people, like their family. For example, grandma keeps forgetting her grandchildren names.
Again, it’s tricky because it’s very common for anyone to forget names and words. And most of us don’t have Alzheimer’s, even if we forget.
Just pay attention. See if it happens more and more often and also check if there are other worrying signs.
3. They ask the same thing again and again
This one is so typical, and frustrating as well. Some people get angry at them and even shout back at them: “I told you already“, “why won’t you pay attention to me?“.
Don’t do this, don’t yell at them. It’s terrible for them. Sometimes we don’t want to admit the reality. We just don’t want to see there is something wrong with our loved one. It’s painful to picture a future where he/she has Alzheimer’s.
They will ask something several times. They’ll ask a question and then, 10 minutes later… they’ll ask exactly the same thing.
People with Alzheimer’s lose their memory backwards. They start forgetting about the most recent stuff and, from there, it goes back in time. Like a movie you start erasing from the end.
I have an anecdote that illustrates this. When my grandmother had an advanced Alzheimer’s, she wouldn’t recognize any of us and she couldn’t remember barely anything. One day, she started to tell a story about how a man she knew used to sleep with a gun under his pillow. We all thought she was raving.
My mum, however, was listening. And she turned pale. She said: “that story is true. It happened over 50 years ago. The man with the gun was her uncle, when she was little”.
I was around 16 at the time and boy, was I shocked…
What to do if you notice these signs
You should take that person to the doctor.
The first thing they’ll do is examine their mental status with some tests. That way, they’ll get an idea of how their memory is working. Depending on the results, sometimes that’s it.
Sometimes the doctor may order some other tests to rule out other conditions. For example, they may order a brain CT or MRI, which allows us to detect brain tumors and other disorders.
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Writing this post was actually hard because, as you could read, my grandma had Alzheimer almost 20 years ago. This post forced me to remember what it felt like when things started going wrong. It was a long time ago but I can still remember the scenes vividly. Upsetting experiences may stay with you for a long time.
To my grandma, Maria Luz. RIP.
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