Worried I’ve got dementia

[Elasticatedwaist]

I’m 46 and although I’ve always been anxious things have got worse the past year or so. Ive not been sleeping like I used to , I wake up too early feeling worried and scared, I’ve got terrible pms rages and crying fits , I’m really tired and I have pressure in my head and headache everyday along with weird vision. Mouth is dry all the time. Although I’m sick of feeling crap I don’t think I feel depressed, I still want to go out with dh and do my hobby etc I’ve been putting it down to perimenopause and finally decided that I’ll phone the doctor on Friday.
Thing is though, I’m scared it’s neither of those things now. I’m terrified I’ve got dementia.
I keep forgetting things. Like yesterday I’d been out for lunch with dh. Later in bed it took me AGES to bring to mind where we had had our lunch and what id eaten.
I couldn’t remember if I was 45 or 46 the other day, had to count up.
I keep losing words. I know what I’m trying to say but can’t remember the word for it.
Each month after the pms i feel like I’ve just woken up from a dream and unfortunately I keep falling out with people.
Am I losing my mind ? Is this dementia rather than anxiety?

Get to a GP for reassurance, my kids GD had a brain tumour (referred for emergency surgery and it was removed withing 4 days of him going to GP) but headaches, forgetfulness and 'losing words' were the first symptoms. He struggled along believing it was stress/tiredness for almost 3 months before GM dragged him to the GP when he struggled to remember the spelling of his own surname.

Hopefully it's Anxiety/stress related but better safe than sorry.

I’m really tired and I have pressure in my head and headache everyday along with weird vision

I missed this sentence, GD also had the vision issue but he put it down to tiredness as well.

Another possible cause would be primary hyperparathyroidism - one of 4 tiny glands near your thyroid that helps regulate your blood calcium levels goes haywire and causes symptoms like you’ve described, often written off by GPs as peri menopause but can be resolved with a small surgery to remove the offending gland.
Might be a bit tricky at the moment but you do need a full blood test to check for the various different things it could be. Whatever it turns out to be, you deserve to have it investigated, diagnosed and treated, not just be left to get on with it.

I went through a phase of forgetting half my nouns - the kids at karate are used to it now . I think that's fairly standard. (I had about six months of hot flushes which ended around about the time lockdown started, but my periods are still with us as erratically as ever.)

I would definitely start with an eye test and tell them about the headaches and pressure. What sort of weird vision? I turned out to have a macular hole and had left it for ages because I assumed the distortion was something to do with getting age-related nearsightedness - which, to be fair, I was also doing. (I had it dealt with and I think it's fine now but the consultant was all Doom and Gloom over how they need to be dealt with within a year or Terrable Things will happen.)

I’ve booked in at the opticians this afternoon and will phone the doctor tomorrow. Feel shocking this morning. Thanks for the replies , hope it’s not a brain tumour.

A friend of mine had shocking headaches during perimenopause. It crept up on her and got really bad to the point that both she and her husband were starting to think there was something seriously wrong. I am not trying to peddle HRT but once she was diagnosed (if that's the right word) and prescribed HRT the headaches. I hope you get an good outcome with the doctor but hopefully it is nothing serious.

@Elasticatedwaist

Thanks for the replies. The anxiety is awful, 4am every morning it’s really bad, I feel absolutely panic stricken for about 3 hours and then I can feel ok again weirdly.

This sounds very much like perimemopause

@Elasticatedwaist

I’ve booked in at the opticians this afternoon and will phone the doctor tomorrow. Feel shocking this morning. Thanks for the replies , hope it’s not a brain tumour.

I'm sorry, I missed this. I hope you can get to the bottom of this soon. Best wishes

That should say the headaches disappeared.

I thought I had early onset dementia, turns out I had a severe B12 deficiency