My mother isn't diagnosed with dementia. She is displaying behavioural stuff. There is a lot of issues with her but it's not memory loss. When chatting with the GPs they keep writing off my concerns for 'memory loss?'.
My understanding of dementia is that there's different types of dementia and they all present differently but as they all progress to later stages they can mimick each other.
I reckon the GP is looking for a textbook style of memory loss before they consider a problem for referral. I am having an awful time trying to get help and a diagnosis. At least rule it in or out.
There is type of dementia that is behavioural based. I read online that it can run in families. My grandmother (her mother) she was never talked about but she needed help in the last few years in a nursing home. The only information that I got was that she crazy but her dementia was mild because she never forgot. This to me is a red flag towards FTD. It's not talked about in the family. Maybe my grandmother wasn't problem diagnosed.
My mother comes from a large family of siblings. There is a lot of them. 12 of them. There is about 6 older siblings and some younger siblings. Something like that.
My mother maintains low contact. They all do. Not out of badness. Just laziness. They send each other a Christmas card every year but that's it. They just kinda have low contact. It's just sparse.
I don't know if dementia is appearing anywhere else in the family. They are all so fucking odd.
I reckon it's only a matter of time before one or the other of them will take a turn and kicks the bucket. I was thinking about this. I was thinking about a funeral. I would like to be prepared for when it does happen.
So basically, I do I go to a funeral and accompany my mother? I was thinking about letting her go alone because then she will be out of routine and I won't be a familiar face and maybe some sort of a behavioural issue might show in those circumstances and maybe I might be able to get more support if one of her siblings was to get on board.
Or would I go and maybe start quizzing the siblings about 'family health' and see if it's appearing anywhere else.
There's definitely something happening but it seems as if GPs and my siblings would like to see a car crash type of scenario to consider a problem.
I would just like to be prepared in what to do of anything was to happen any time soon.
I do know of her own brother's had an accident approx 10 years ago. Fell and hit his head and he wasn't right since then and he has been in a nursing home. Nobody talks about this. He doesn't behave properly. I am thinking of her has dementia and the behavioural dementia but it's not known and it's masked because family thinks it's from the fall. I reckon he has the behavioural dementia like my grandmother but maybe it's just not known because of his fall. People probably contribute his bad behaviours from the fall.