Sometimes, hope is all you have

My mom was diagnosed with moderate dementia on Wednesday. Upon hearing the news, my mom seems to have gotten worse. She's confused. It all comes on suddenly. One day she's fine and the next day she doesn't know my name.

Today, she thinks I'm my sister Donna. She is telling me all about Susan and how Susan deserves a lot of credit for what she's done. It's so weird to hear her talking to me as though I'm my sister. Correcting her doesn't do any good, but I find myself doing it anyway.

Helleborus Niger doesn't seem to be working anymore, bummer.

Last night my mom was agitated and had trouble sleeping. She hallucinated a lot. She was up at 2:30am and called me on my cellphone. I went down to her room to check on her and she was fully dressed and had packed one of my reusable shopping bags with random things. She told me about an explosion.

I assured her that there wasn't an explosion and everyone was safe. She asked me where all of her kids were, one by one I told her where they were... in there homes and safe. I got her to put on her nightgown and get back in bed. She did after about 30 minutes.

I finally fell back to sleep about 5am.

At 6:30am my mom came into our bedroom and asked me who died. Oh boy, here we go... welcome to crazy Monday! I told her no one died and walked her back downstairs. I convinced her to put her nightgown back on (she was fully dressed again) and get some sleep. She did.

She didn't sleep.

8am she got out of bed and got dressed for the day... again. She was confused. Her blood pressure was high. Her blood sugar was high too ... 97. Normally it's in the low 80's.

I've noticed that when she gets agitated blood pressure and blood sugar numbers are higher than usual.

I did some research today, trying to figure out what kind of dementia my mom has. I think it could be Lewy's Body Dementia.

She seems to have all the core symptoms. Here's a site that explains what Lewy's Body Dementia is - http://alzheimers-disease.suite101.com/article.cfm/dlb_dementia_with_lewy_bodies_in_2009

To make my post shorter, I did come across an Ayurevedic remedy for senile dementia, Ashwaganda which has a similar ingredient as the drugs that are prescribed for Alzheimer's. My mom was diagnosed 6 years ago as having early onset parkinsons disease. As I read about Ashwaganda I thought, hmmm... maybe this could help my mom.

Off we went to Whole Foods to buy some... we got the last bottle. She had 8 drops in a cup of tea about 2 hours ago.

Just before I gave her dinner she asked me if I like living here. I told her that I do... that I love my backyard. Then she smiled and said, "I like living here too. I feel good."

So, maybe the Ashwaganda will help us all get a good night sleep every night and keep the people away.

Ashwaganda is my new hope for my mom.