New Life

I so understand how lonely you feel - and I'm so sorry you're going through this 😣 I also feel really alone, and often really sad at the injustice of it.

I was also diagnosed relatively young, 2.5 years ago, with a rare form of early Alzheimer's/dementia that attacks the neurovisual part of the brain first. But I am also having word-finding problems and I hate it. I used to be so proud of how fluent I am, and never saying "umm" or "uhh".

In case it's useful, what I've found is that the word is still in my brain. What has worsened is retrieving it. If I take a moment, and try to calm myself, the word comes back. And I've found some work-arounds, like looking down, or otherwise taking time to remember.

There is a list of tips and tricks on the UK Alzheimer's support website that I find helpful. The link is <https://forum.alzheimers.org.uk/forums/i-have-dementia.56/>

And, also, in case it's helpful, there are things you can do to slow down the progression: do cardio exercise (20 min a day if possible - fast walking counts!) because it makes the blood circulate through your brain, and helps to wash the Amyloïd plaques, make sure to keep up with your social interactions (that has been shown to have the most positive impact on this horrible illness), try to keep using your brain (learn a new language on DuoLingo, or read, or do puzzles), and - the hardest for me - try to diminish stress (as if we can, given this diagnosis)>

Welcome to a community that nobody wants to belong to. But we are here for each other.