ALZHEIMERS AND DEMENTIA. WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE?

First a joke to lighten the mood a little.There follows the recorded message an immaginary, [ I hope!] Medical Centre. " Hello and Welcome to the Mental Health Hotline. If you are obsessive compulsive press 1 repeatedly. If you are codependent please ask someone to press 2. If you have multiple personalities press 3,4,5 & 6. If you are paranoid we know who you are and what you want. Stay on the line so we can trace your call. If you are delusional press 7 and your call will be transferred to the mother ship. If you are schizophrenic listen carefully and a small voice will tell you which number to press. If you are manic depressive, it doesn't matter which button as no one will answer. If you have amnesia press 8 and state your name,address, date of birth, phone number and social security number and mother's maiden name. If you have short term memory loss press 9. If you have short term memory loss press 9. If you have short term memory loss press 9. If you have post traumatic stress disorder slowly and carefully press 0,0,0. If you have low self esteem please hang up. All of our operators are too busy to talk to you. Young people can have no idea how much the world has changed in 50 years. Of course medical science has advanced and communication has become a large part of peoples lives. When I see vast numbers of people with cellphones at their ears I think that perhaps a medical proceedure could be easily available to attach the phone permanently and it would become another ear. Perhaps tattoo parlours could carry out the simple operation. I am sure that the risk would be no greater than blood poisoning from tattoos and rings through lips, noses and other unmentionable places! Apart from the improvements to life that have happened in so many areas, the reverse is the amazing complexity of modern life and the 'new speak', that has occurred. Almost everything is now described by two or three letters; UN, AA, UAE, EU, US etc etc. This is fine with the obvious kind of examples mentioned but there are now thousands of things that everyone under thirty understands that I don't! This is the area in which I find that my memory loss and dementia is most distressing. Just understanding what people are talking about is becoming an increasing problem. The other problem that I find is the amount of conflicting information that there is about memory loss, dementia and alzheimers. When I first started searching the web to clarify what was happening to me I read that people suffering from dementia had a 75% chance of it becoming Alzheimers. However today I have just read the difference between alzheimers and dementia is that dementia is the symptom and alzheimers disease the cause. If that is correct then all dementia sufferers are actually already suffering from alzheimers Which one of the above is the correct answer? I am going to a workshop for alzheimer sufferers and carers this week, hopefully I will have the answer by the weekend. Once again I notice a slight deterioration in memory and cognitive abilities. One thing that happened is quite amusing. During school term I take Julian's son to his school bus stop. This involves getting up at about 5.20 and then dropping the boy off and going back to bed until about 7. The other morning I woke up as usual, glanced at the clock, saw that it was gone 6 and leaped out of bed and began putting on my trousers, racing down the passage to tell Charlie that we had overslept. I only had one leg in my trousers and couldn't find the boy and raced back to the bedroom where Julian was quietly laughing. I looked at her with confusion. "Why are you laughing? We have to get Charlie to school!" "Darling you took him an hour ago!" Even I thought that it was funny, but sadly it is another example of the increasing blank spots. The weather is glorious and not too hot. All the animals are well and barking happily or chirping contentedly. Not many avocados left, so I suppose that the squirels will move on to plunder someone else's crops! Keep taking the tablets. Thank you for your letters and comments. All much appreciated. Please keep the information rolling in. David Barnato. Paarl. South Africa.