I have always heard that the kind of memory problems you need to worry about are not forgetting where you put your keys, but forgetting what your keys are used for.
That would be awful!!
Bus, you need to have the technique to associate people’s name with something to help you remember. Today I met someone who used to work my husband, he is 72, but after my husband introduced our daughter’s names, he forgot their names within a few minutes, he kept asking for their names. It turned out he’s sort of a vegetarian and his doctor said if he eats meat, he gets vitamin B. I’m not sure vitamin B includes B-12 or not.
Many people who are vegetarian end up having to take b12 shots. It is quite common. Severe deficiency does lead to memory loss.
http://www.webmd.com/vitamins-supplements/ingredientmono-926-VITAMIN%20B12.aspx?activeIngredientId=926&activeIngredientName=VITAMIN%20B12
I’ve never had a fantastic memory for names, but it’s definitely gotten worse in the last few years – not so much the names of people I presently know, but the names of actors and baseball players and other famous people, and people I used to work with 15 years ago, all of which I used to be pretty good at retrieving. And the harder I try to remember the name, even though I know it’s in there somewhere, the more frustrated I get. It feels like I’ve lost the key to the filing cabinet in my head. A few weeks ago I couldn’t for the life of me remember Kate Winslet’s name, and spent 15 minutes trying to think of it without looking her up. Earlier today, I was talking with my son about mass murderers and serial killers (a pleasant conversational topic), and couldn’t remember the name of “that serial killer who was supposed to be so good-looking.” My son finally had to tell me, after I failed to pick up on his hint (“shares a last name with a famous television character in a sitcom”). And so on. Ugh.
Donna,
There is a part of the brain that involves both memory consolidation and emotion (the amygdala). so emotionally charged experiences tend to be remembered (though severely emotionally charged ones may be blocked out). This is why many of us oldie goldies remember what we were doing and where were when Kennedy was shot (younger folks remember Pricess Di’s death or 9/11). So when as a young grad student I was at a campus not far from where young ladies were being brutalized and murdered by Ted Bundy and we lived in fear, his name is etched in my brain forever.
I also have a big problem remembering names of actors and actresses. It’s really annoying. I was never particularly good with names, but now it’s kind of embarrassing. Sometimes I’ll look at my paperwork to remember the name of the guy who I am working with, who is sitting right next to me. I’ve had times that I’ve come downstairs to meet the other person on my trip (who I had worked with the night prior), and realize that I have absolutely no memory of what he looks like! Fortunately, it’s the guy in the uniform, but sometimes there are other people. I credit it to fatigue, but it really has started to bother me. Maybe it was always like this, but as you get older, you start to worry more about the mental stuff. My family has all sorts of brain issues. Dementia, Alzheimers, Parkinsons, strokes. It doesn’t matter that it was all people in their eighties, I don’t want to suffer from that at any age.
DrGoogle, I wonder if that guy is low on B12. That’s pretty important. I think that vegetarians should make sure and get plenty of blood tests, to make sure they aren’t deficient in anything.
I seem to experience waxing and waning periods of cognitive decline. Just a couple of nights ago, I had something I intended to microwave, but opened the freezer door instead (and immediately felt like a complete idiot). Other times, I’ll resolve to list something I need to buy at the supermarket, but quickly forget what that thing was moments after having retrieved a pen and paper, or I’ll walk into a room to do/get something and immediately have to wrack my brain trying to remember what I’m there for. Once in a while, I’ll lose a conversational train of thought in mid-sentence (hate that!). It can go on for weeks, but then suddenly stop, and I’m back to my normal self.
I can remember the names of people I use to know and work with more than 20 years ago, though. H is always amazed by this, because once a person leaves his daily routine (with the exception of family and friends), they may as well have never existed.
Bus, I think he is low on B-12 or some B vitamins because he said other parts of his body didn’t respond well to test. He didn’t seem to have any problem except with names of people he just met or names of famous people.
But in the book from Dr Mary Newport, she wrote her husband was never good with memory when he was younger, so that’s something to pay attention. If one didn’t have something good when one was younger, it has great chance off decline. But it’s not just memory, I’ve heard on the news that people with Alzheimer’s have lessen sense of smell. Eyesight is another indication, there are tests that can be picked up by eye test, I forgot which at the moment.
This is one anecdote, my brother’s FIL had both Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s. Five years before he passed away, he came and talked to me at my dad’s funeral, his eyes were blank. There were no sparkling in his eyes. So I think all the things that are above the head shows some indication. Memory, eyesight, smell test all are interrelated.
Haven’t read all of the posts, but there is a multi center clinical trial on a new Alzheimers drug that looks very promising. So promising in fact, that they skipped phase 2 testing and now are in phase 3. From this point in phase 3 to FDA approval to market will take maybe 1-5 years.
If near a site of the multi center trial, maybe s/he can enroll? Or wait (with fingers crossed) for 1-5 years for drug to be released in the market.
I misplaced the trial number of the drug. If I find it, I’ll post it so you can google search it by the number. I know that UCLA is one of the trial centers and one of my patients has enrolled in the trial.
I’m very excited about it because I have many generations of Alzheimers in my family.
I hope your friend figures out if he is low on something, it is easy enough to test for and pump up the supplements, or get a shot.
My doctor was talking about Dr Newport’s book when I asked her about coconut oil yesterday. She is a big fan of coconut oil, and says she always uses it when she cooks. However, she said it does raise cholesterol and not everyone cares for the taste, so it isn’t for everyone. Yeah, I know what you mean about that sparkle in the eyes. My FIL lost that awhile before he died, though every now and then we could get him going. I don’t ever want to lose that!
@donna l-
Welcome to the club! In the past x years that is what I have noticed, how I cannot remember names of common things, like actors and actresses, famous people, etc, yet I can remember some names for some reasons of some pretty obscure things. From what I have been told, garbage collection in the brain tends to shift things like names we don’t use and so forth to long term memory and it can be hard to recall them. But yeah, I have the same thing, seems to be common to aging, along with achy joints, hurting myself doing common things, and wondering where i put the car keys:)
As far as the original post, I would have your friend talk to a nutritionist, there has been a lot of work on nutrition and alzheimers, and one of the things I have been reading is that older people need more fat in their diet, and often don’t get it, in part because doctors are still promoting the fat is evil, causes heart disease stuff, so a lot of older people, worried about their hearts, are eating very low fat diets, and it can be causing a problem. They don’t need to eat a lot of meat, from what I know nut oils are as effective as animal fats, but a diet that has a decent amount of fat in it may help slow down the symptoms (again, I am not an MD, this is just from what I have read). It isn’t just B12, apparently fats are needed by the brain to function, specifically in the memory area, they use it to synthesize certain compounds that affect memory I seem to recall.
The other thing is to look at things like cookware and other things and try to eliminate exposure to aluminum, ingesting that is a disaster area, I am really surprised aluminum cookware hasn’t been banned. One of the things that has come out in recent years has been an upsurge of Alzheimers among Asians, both in the US and in their native countries, which was a big surprise given the healthiness of Asian cooking and such. The one thing they seem to be pointing to is the use of rice cookers, most of which are aluminum. A lot of cookware sold is aluminum, and if your friend is cooking with stuff like that, might be worth trying to get her to get rid of it.
I have little short term memory, although I am working on it.
When I meet someone, I forget their name right away, but I now ask them again, and I repeat it, which seems to help.
I also have Prosopagnosia( face blindness). which is very embarrassing. I was standing next to one of my friends, that I hadnt seen for a few mnths, but still.
Also very hard to recognize someone that I have met in the last few years out of context, but I can see someone that I know better, but havent seen them for 15 years and still recognize them.
I recognized and remembered the name of a young man that D went to high school with, at the grocery store, 18 years later( but wasnt in her class), and kids, especially boys, change a lot from high school. However, he was in theatre productions, so I spent alot of time watching him, whereas when I meet someone, I am uncomfortable looking at their face for very long.
There are alot of studies, currently, Im sure there is some thing in our area, the difficult part will be, broaching the subject. Im not great about gently leading into a subject, I get distracted and farther away from the topic I want to bring up. :">
72, agree with your post #100. In the 90s, a lot of popular book was against fat, transfer, etc.., one particular book by Dr Weil, suggesting eating healthy vegetable diet, low fat to help guard against cancer, heart attack, etc.. But only recently did the study becomes clear that the cholesterol that your body produce depends on your body and not the food you eat. One can eat lots of fatty food and still not high in cholesterol, my husband has such diet but his cholesterol actually much lower than his number taken 20 years ago. Now whenever his doctor circles the cholesterol number because it's border line, I don't get too alarmed.
Regarding aluminum, I’ve read something about it and got rid of all my aluminum pots. Same with copper pots. A little amount is not good because I’ve read online when purchasing vitamin, don’t purchase anything with even a little copper.
Lots of supplements contain copper, mine is a little high. Some of our pipes are copper I think.
Its more important to have a zinc/ copper balance, Ive read, than remove all copper.
Copper should be 70% of your zinc blood level.
One way to ingest coconut oil, and what I do - is make a coffee latte using a teaspoon of it.
Hot coffee, plus teaspoon of coconut oil in blender, - it whips into nice frothy latte ( I do add little sugar because I’m so used to sugar in coffee )
You can stir with coconut oil, but it’s weird using to cook eggs.
Aluminum pans gone, using toms deodorant ( you will never hear aluminum chlorhydrate touted these days, like we heard growing up)
Husband taking turmeric, eating leafy green veggies.
OP- Emeraldkity- I’d be very careful sharing what you are learning about dementia with someone recently diagnosed with early onset. What a devastating diagnosis and people may not want to know too much too fast.
@drgoogle you make a good point -
Dementias like alzheimers, Parkinson dementia, or vascular dementia, or Lewy body dementia are brain failures- not just memory impairment.
Google " teepa snow and brain failure" because she explains which areas of the Brain are effected and behaviors, and emphasizes it is " brain failure" -
Interesting - as dementia progresses, people lose peripheral vision.
Excellent explanation by teepa here
Less than three minute teepa snow segment, explaining how the vision field is effected by dementia and how that effects behavior.
Enlightening …
There are two trend if thoughts that I think maybe converging. Alzheimer’s is the third wheel of diabetes even for non diabetic people, the brain doesn’t get enough energy like your body so brain cells die off. The other is the inflammation of the brain therefore also causes brain cells to die. Turmeric will help with the inflammation part. Coconut will help delivering short term chain energy to the cell. All these are my theory from reading, I’m not a doctor so I don’t want to be beaten up by some real doctor either.
My husband takes turmeric because it helps with his leg/heel. But it doesn’t hurt the rest of his body either.
He fried egg every morning wit coconut oil. We eat lots of coconut cake. Take vitamins, stay away from grain bread.
On top of that I invest in biotech, hoping for a cure. They are all precautions for a good quality of life even if there is AD in the future. That’s all I can think of doing and carry on with my life.
Interesting. I’ll bet coconut oil tastes great in brownies. And chocolate chip cookies, all the things I’m trying not to eat, but want to. Never heard of turmeric for your brain, but I can tell you that if you leave it on your hair too long, it will turn a shocking shade of fluorescent green 
Gonna have to start taking this stuff.