My thoughts

What is very confusing for me is that the new neurologist doesn’t think that I have dementia. Next month, I will be having a three-hour neuro neuropsychological evaluation, which I have never had before. A few weeks ago, I met with the doctor at the memory clinic and he asked me lots of questions to determine whether I needed this testing done and how long the testing should take. He agreed that there are some problems that should be looked into. I told him that I often struggle with comprehension and he said that they would also test for language. He can’t even believe that nine years after my diagnosis, that I’m functioning pretty well. He is also questioning a diagnosis of dementia and hopes that the tests will give some answers. I will be having these tests in September. Then I will have a follow-up appointment with my neurologist in October to go over the test results.

Could it be that I have never had dementia or could it be that I was diagnosed so much earlier than most of the patients that my doctor sees that he has no idea what I’m dealing with? My gut feeling is that there is something wrong with my brain. Hopefully, next month I will have some real answers as to what is going on with my brain!

UPDATE: October 2020 While I was organizing and editing my posts in preparation of getting my book published, I was a little confused as I read this one. As I read this post again, I couldn't believe that I still thought that I had dementia. This must have been a bad day for me. The reason that I say this is that this post is referring to a third neurologist. I'm not sure why I was so confused when I wrote this post. I do know that sometimes confusion is just part of living with a memory impairment. I know that in 2005 my diagnosis was changed from EOAD to MCI- mild cognitive impairment. How did I forget that nine years later? In reading through my journals, I know that when my diagnosis was changed from EOAD to MCI, that my primary care doctor said that he felt that I had dementia and not MCI.