Thinking about Dementia

Introduction

A couple of days ago, the Plot the Plays song of the day was It's Just a Burning Memory, and as I type this, I think that Libet's Delay is going to be the one for today. I listened to it a few times too many, and so here's what I typed up.

Transcript

> Dementia terrifies the [heck] outta me

> Like come on

> Your brain is degenerating to the point where you can't even begin to recall what you're forgetting

> You fail to remember where you are, who you love, who you yourself are

> But there are moments where you do that just remind you that it's happening to you

> Your body eventually begins to degrade without the nervous system backing it up, without reminders to eat when hungry or urinate when your bladder is full

> The brain forgets how to swallow, with saliva or food passing into the trachea causing infection

> The disease never actually kills you, but shuts the body off incrementally until something else does

> And you will never be able to face it without facing it alone

> You can't tell anyone what you're forgetting

> You don't recognize anyone anymore

> Genuinely my number one all-time fear

Reflecting on All That

Ignoring the accuracy of what I said (it should be pretty truthful; I did do some light searching), I want to issue one slight correction: my all-time fear is losing my mental function. This encompasses Dementia/Alzheimer's, but it also adds psychosis and Schizophrenia to the list. That's an important clarification to me, because I can tell you from my first time having severe dehydration, I couldn't tell that anything was off mentally. You think everything is normal, and you aren't aware of just what is really going on. At least when I got Influenza A last year and Type B a month ago, I could tell that I was having fever dreams and wasn't okay. Something like a sudden, never-before-seen attack of psychosis, however? What would clue you into the fact that it wasn't just reality? And if what you were perceiving wasn't real, what did you actually do? What if you just screwed up your life What if you hurt someone? Ruined someone else's life irrecoverably? That concept, that you can't trust yourself.. it terrifies me.

I'm gonna go listen to some upbeat pop music before I slip back into that devastating state of mind I was in when I sent those messages to the boys in our Discord server.