This is a love story from start to finish, Irene and Rachael's. Based on the diaries of Rachael Dixey who looked after her civil partner Irene after she developed early onset Alzheimer's disease, the book opens with the lines: Irene, Alzheimer's and me - Alzheimer's came between us. It does that, drives you and the love of your life apart, going your separate ways because you cannot follow. That's the story really, that's it. The end. But it is also the beginning of the story, which shows how life can still be lived despite losing a life partner to dementia, and how to cope emotionally and practically with a disease that robs you of your loved one a thousand times before they die. The story charts the daily decline and inexorable loss of Irene to dementia. With the dramatic deterioration in Irene's health Rachael turns from lover and soul mate to career and, finally, single woman. Eventually, no longer able to cope with Irene at home, she makes the agonizing decision to allow Irene to be put in a care home. There she spent her last six years. When she died aged 66, the couple had spent half their life together. This book is a powerful and moving account of the progression of dementia, and raises serious questions about how our society cares for those who develop the disease, especially at a young age and in the gay, lesbian community. It also deals with loss and grief, during the illness and afterwards. Their memoir will be invaluable for anyone affected by dementia, those working in mental health and those caring for a loved one with a life-changing and incurable illness. Our Dementia Diary tells with brutal honesty of love, loss and life with Alzheimer's and opens up discussion of how dementia can be handled better.

Keith Oliver was diagnosed with Alzheimer's in 2010, and has since become a leading activist for dementia care, and an international speaker. Telling his story through a diary format, this book gives an unparalleled insight into what day-to-day life with dementia is like, and how he continued to live a full life after diagnosis.

PAPERBACK & DOWNLOAD EDITIONS---For 15 years, Robert Tell was his widowed Mom's caregiver as her mind and personality disappeared into the fog of dementia. He tells the tale with compassion and humor in this full length, fast moving memoir. His lesson: Caregiver burnout can be helped. If you are watching your loved one vanish into the sinkhole of Alzheimer's Disease (or another dementia), "Dementia Diary" will lift your spirits.

The Long Goodbye: Dementia Diaries discusses a disease that is both personal and social for more than five million patients and their families and friends in the United States today. Now that there are medical strategies for preventing and/or curing strokes, heart attacks, even cancer, many more people are going to live into the dementia years in the near future. Although many dementia horror stories circulate in conversation and in the media, they are not the whole story. Creative approaches to loving a dementia patient can make for a valuable learning experience for family and caregivers. In The Long Goodbye Margaret Miles describes her commitment to making--rather than passively suffering--her spouse's dementia experience. Family and friends who accompany patients find embedded in the experience moments of great beauty, hilariously funny incidents, new companions, and life insights. The narrative provides both a travelogue and suggestions for a richly meaningful life passage for all participants. The Long Goodbye seeks to supply a balanced picture of a disease usually represented as unmitigated loss.

One who Forgets and One who is Forgotten One in eight over the age of sixty-five and one in three over the age of eighty will be diagnosed with Alzheimers Disease. In her memoir, author Joan Sutton narrates a moving account of her years as caregiver to her husband, noting that Alzheimers is a disease of the brain that is paid for with the currency of the heart. A member of the board of overseers of The Alzheimers Drug Discovery Foundation, she stresses the need to develop more effective treatment for the five million Americans currently diagnosed with this incurable disease, pointing out that for every patient there is a large circle of others also affected. Sutton offers practical advice for the care of the caregiver and the patient, and shares the pain that came as she watched pieces of her husbands self disappear. Following his death, after what Nancy Reagan described as the long goodbye, she writes candidly about coping with her new status as a widow and the aching loneliness of the heart that is the price paid for having known a great love. 100% of the authors royalties (20 to 40% of the purchase price) will benefit the Alzheimers Drug Discovery Foundation/Canada. Cover design by John R. Lewis

The true happenings of the time in the life of Nellie May born in April. A little joke we shared with Nellie regarding when she was born. Nellie did not have a happy childhood with a dad who beat her, she went through traumatic times when she had to go in the air raid shelter during the war when she was growing up. She went to a comprehensive school and started work at the age of 14. When Nellie was in her fifties, she liked to have a drink. I remember one day a taxi driver came to our house and asked if Nellie was at home I said no, he said I think I have her in my car (and he had). Looking back, we had some very funny times. Nellie was the life and soul of the party. She was feisty, head strong, not afraid to speak her mind, funny, loving, caring and beautiful she would do anything for anyone. She loved to dance and sing and play the organ. Nellie was in her eighties when she developed the terrible disease dementia, of which these diaries are about to tell. There were sad times but also some happy times. Nellie would always pronounce the word baby as babby as that is how she would say it. These diaries tell of what happened during her time with dementia.

HARD COVER EDITION------WHAT'S IT LIKE to be the only son of a widowed mother who is rapidly sinking into the opaque fog of dementia, and who lives alone half a continent away? ROBERT TELL tells this tale with compassion and humor. DEMENTIA DIARY reads like fiction and covers the fifteen year period from his father's shocking death in a department store to his mother's 92nd birthday. It is meant to be a portable support group. If you have watched helplessly as your parent, spouse or friend's identity disappeared into the sinkhole of Alzheimer's Disease (or another dementia), this heart-wrenching memoir will touch you deeply