Hello

My name is Jane and my father is Larry.  He'll be 71 years old June 30th.
He was diagnosed with Alzheimer's 13 months ago.  My father had been pretty
forgetful for most of our lives so when he was diagnosed us kids, 21, 38,
41, 43, if you can consider us kids, were shocked.  Anyway, dad was put on
medication and the first 11 months were pretty uneventful.  Dad repeated
himself alot, but that wasn't unusual for us.  We did notice that he was
more aggressive but we liked it, my dad was waaayyy to laid back and was
stepped on a lot by people, to see him put his foot down and not take any
crap was great.

Well my dad has other health issues along with Alzheimer's, he also is a
diabetic, and that has caused other issues, like congestive heart disease
(diagnosed in April)  He had a double bypass.  Since his heart surgery, his
Alzheimer's has progressed rapidly.  In two months time, dad had gone from
still working 40 hours a week to living in a nursing home.  He had gotten
athletes foot in the hospital (transitional care facility) and because of
his diabetes the sores didn't heal and became infected to the point he had
to have all the dead tissue surgically removed and was hospitalized again.
It was between the two smaller toes on one foot.  He had cut his left foot
and that isn't healing either.  Due to the diabetes his arteries have
deteriated horribly in his legs and he has no circulation below his shins.
Today we found out the arteries are beyond help, stints can not be placed in
his legs to improve the circulation, so he will have to undergo amputation
of both legs, just below the knees, as his feet are now turning black, and
smell awful.  This has been very hard on my step mom of 30 years and my
oldest sister, who is really like a mom to the rest of us.  My step mother
has a genetic heart disease that is incurable and has gone under the knife
so many times I can't even count.  She now lives with 18 stints in her
arteries on her heart, and can not have one more placed.  So her next attack
will probably be her last.  She is 20 years younger then my father.  There
that should be enough health history to tell you what's going on in our
house.

My dad has had some extreme type of hallucinations, I.e. he told my sister
he "couldn't put his feet on the floor because of all the blood on the floor
from the gang wars."  My sister just smiled at him and said, "Dad I think
you should not be watching so many violent DVD's."  Dad just smiled back.
My dad loves Sci-Fi.  We bought him a little TV for his room with a built in
DVD player, he loves to watch TV.  He woke up scared and it took him
probably an hour to figure out where he was, and he actually said, "ok I
remember now, I'm ok."  He also will not sleep in a bed, we had to bring his
lazy boy to the nursing home for him to sleep in and made them take the bed
out.  At times he seems to be resigned to what is happening to him and
around him.  I feel horribly guilty that he's not living with one of us, but
I also understand the 24 hour supervision that is needed, and my whole
family works.  None of us can afford to quit our jobs to take care of him
full time.  We take turns nightly visiting him for several hours at the
nursing home, but everytime I have to leave to go home I feel horrible
leaving him there.  He doesn't complain and the nurses and care providers
are so sweet to him and flirt with him, and just love him, but I still feel
guilty.  I live the furthest way, so I see him the least, my step mom and
little brother is only about 7 blocks away so she is there daily, my sister
lives about 7 miles away so she is there every other night and my brother is
about 10 miles away and he is there about 4 times a week, so he has one of
us there everyday.  That is reassuring to me, but how does one make the
guilt stop?

Anyway, I know this becomes progressively worse, my sister and I have tried
to prepare ourselves for this, my step mother and brothers are both in
denial and refuse to believe that this is happening.  They see it happening
but it seems to be hitting them so much harder then my sister and I.  I just
don't understand how two months ago he was relatively normal to so darn sick
and falling apart physically and mentally now.  Anyway I'll be lurking and
reading I just wanted to introduce myself.

Jane A