Book Giveaway Winner Goodreads,and New Zealand stuff- love the Kiwis

Congratulations to Stan down there, over in Christchurch, New Zealand. He is the winner of the When Can I Go Home? Goodreads book giveaway. He will receive a signed copy of the book.
I have got to say I love and always will have a fondness in my heart for New Zealand. Long ago when I was a young man like age 32, in the early 90's, I worked a locum tenans psychiatry job in old Palmerston North, New Zealand. working at Wanganui-Manawatu Health later named Mid-Central Health. I was fresh out of residency and life was hopeful. It seemed optimistic that you could actually pay off your loans and get out of debt as a practicing psychiatrist. -Ha!. It seemed like being a physician was a respectable thing to do in society (I hadn't lived in MN yet hah ha.) and all around life was okay. The world seemed my oyster. So I explored the world including N Zed.
Working and paying taxes there was interesting. The things that I remember most about the work are the fact that the Kiwis never seemed to wear shoes in the summer. I was there in Dec and Jan, the middle of summer. In terms of psychiatry the thing that I will never forget is that NZ was a much less violent society. It came out all the time in the daily practice of psychiatry. The Kiwi's were not always interested in getting ahead of one another, of messing one another up of dominating one another, of killing one another. It affected a person's mental health. It was a cultural phenomenon. They were less violent. It was also nice not to take you life into you hands every day as many American psychiatrists have to. They were polite too. "Please" and "thank-you" were rampant.
I remember the boiling ground and Geo-thermic activity in Rotorua, Jet Boating, Climing Mt Taranaki or Eggmont, whichever you prefer; Repelling into a cave at Waitomo and wathcing glowworms on the ceiling; hitch hiking from Nelson on Christmas Day to get to Picton, to catch the Ferry across the Cook Straight to get back to work,  and of course bungi jumping at Lake Taupo (I enclosed an old pic)
Driving on the left, eating pies for lunch, meat pies (before I had to worry about cholesterol)
Hanging out and exploring and doing many of these adventure with my buddy Darren, who worked as a psych tech.

Sad to say I only spent a few hours in the city of Christchurch on the South Island, where Stan lives. Remember that's where the earthquake was, It seems in the United States if something is not blasted in our face by the media we quickly forget. It was only a couple months and 181 people died there. So remember them and their families in you hearts and prayers. Now is the hard part for grieving. Remember all the "disaster mental health experts" have pulled out, because there is now little chance of getting their mug on the TV and flaunting their expertise. The sad things is this is when the going gets the toughest, after a disater when the media and experts have pulled out.

Anyways NZ rocks!

Simpler Times Lake Taupo Bungi Jumping

Is There A Dr. In The House?

NO there is not. See Doc is playing in the sunshine in California. Long Beach, CA that is. I drove up from Oceanside about 80 miles south to see the bugger. You know he is all sunburned and man his wife must not feed him.  A good wind could take him away.  Just being a pain Doc.  He is well and it was great to see him. This is his nutty friend with Alzheimer's, just letting you know that today he is fine.

God Bless & Keep You &This Country of Ours!!!!
joe
Living With Alzheimers

BOOK SIGNING IN LONG BEACH: ALZHEIMER'S DISCUSSION and Q&A

I will be in Long Beach, California on Tuesday April 5th for two separate Alzheimer's Discussions and Book Signings for When Can I Go Home? I am pleased to say that the signings will be held at Two Neighborhood Branch Libraries of the very fine and extensive Long Beach Public Library System. 

First is Alamitos Neighborhood Library April 5th from 12-1 PM.

Later that Day at Los Altos Neighborhood Library April 5th from 4-5 PM.

Both Events are Free and open to the Public.

Don't Forget April 10-16 is National Library Week



My mother died of Alzheimer's disease.......

Wow, it has been two months since I posted on this blog. Not much new in the Alzheimer's world as far as cures or new effective treatments. Of course the National Alzheimer's project passed, if you are suffering with AD or are a caregiver, this really does not change much in your life on a day to day basis. Perhaps our children or our children's children will not have to be stricken with AD.

24 years ago today, March 6, 1987, my mother died from Alzheimer's disease. Her children were at her bedside as she took her last breath. It was five days before her seventieth birthday. I was 25 years old and a third year medical student. She had been diagnosed 9 years before she died and went through all the classic stages of AD. By the time she died it had been so long, since I had known her as my mother, since she was able to converse, laugh, smile, at times it was hard to remember her that way.

About 10 minutes before she died, I was sitting at the foot of her bed. (We were all holding vigil, she was fairly comatose, No feeding tube, just nasal cannula oxygen. She had been like that for almost two weeks/ We all wanted her to stop suffering, we wanted it to be over. For her torment and suffering at the hands of this rotten nefarious neurologically deteriorating process.)  In the final ten minutes of her physical life on earth, a wave of anguish came over me. I had a sense, some atavistic instinct that it was over.  She was leaving the earth.  I started to cry hard, and I felt so terrible, it seemed that all the years I had tried to be strong during her ordeal were coming out. I didn't want her to die, I wanted her to be back and be her old self. I knew somehow that it was over, the Alzheimer's had taken everything and the last thing left to take was her physical life, her breath.

The sad thing is, when you loose a parent to Alzheimer's, you feel like a part of yourself dies with them. That feeling never goes away. I think because it in part a living death every day. A slow progressive heartbreaking daily thing. On one hand you hope for a cure, and on another hand you want them to get better and die and stop suffering. It is a profoundly ambivalent form of grief. Then when they do physically die you are so damn heartbroken over the whole long drawn out process.
another year has clicked by. most of us always remember the date our parents died. I guess it is one more way to mark the life cycle.

To all those struggling, if you are having a bad day, hang in there, life is not static it is dynamic, it will not always feel as bad as today. If you are a caregiver and you loved one is having a good day, cherish it, laugh, smile, hold it in your heart forever. God Bless