The Reveal...

A few months ago, my dad began showing signs of some erratic behavior.  It wasn't anything drastic... his insomnia was worse and it seemed like that caused some worsening confusion. All of his behaviors could be explained away:

His doctor said that the insomnia was not abnormal in people his age... as we age, we need less sleep.

He had 2 shoulder replacements... of course he was not as tired since he was not able to be as active as he had been before.  It would be better once he was completely healed up and could get back to normal levels of activity.

He didn't want to spend time at family gatherings... we assumed it was because his hearing aids made it hard to hear in a group.  Or maybe his depression was acting up... but he doesn't want to take meds and otherwise seems ok.... lets respect his privacy and wishes.

He says borderline inappropriate things ... but then he has always been a little off... he must just be getting more and more set in his ways as he gets older.  

We tell him over and over again that it is not ok in today's society to walk up to a strangers kid and touch their cheek... WE know there is nothing 'off' in his intent... he grew up in a different time and just likes little kids in a non-creepy way and doesn't get that times have changed.

 He wasn't exhibiting signs of Alzheimer-like behavior... his memory was just fine.  We were on the lookout for that, due to family history.  What we DIDN'T know was there is a different type of dementia... one where memory isn't the primary issue.  Everything else is.

FTD - Frontotemporal Dementia  aka Frontal Lobe Dementia aka Picks Disease aka 10-other-names.

This disease is where the metabolic activity of the front and side portions of the brain (among others) slows and stops.  The cells of the brain die off and the brain actually shrinks.  These portions of the brain do many things... higher executive functions and language are two of them.  

The disease tends to take one of three paths... Behavioral, Language and Movement... but these 3 paths will usually converge as the disease progresses.

In the Language Variant, people will lose their ability to speak and use language.

The Movement variant is familiar to some... it is known as ALS

My dad is experiencing the behavioral variant which means he is losing his executive functions.  From Wikipedia:

Executive functions (collectively referred to as executive function and cognitive control) are a set of cognitive processes that are necessary for the cognitive control of behavior: selecting and successfully monitoring behaviors that facilitate the attainment of chosen goals. Executive functions include basic cognitive processes such as attentional control, cognitive inhibition, inhibitory control, working memory, and cognitive flexibility. Higher order executive functions require the simultaneous use of multiple basic executive functions and include planning and fluid intelligence (i.e., reasoning and problem solving).^[1][2][3]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_functions

Basically, this means he is losing his ability to reason, all impulse control, social filters, interest in hobbies, interest in family.  He is highly repetitive and obsessive.  In short... he needs 24 hour supervision.

So this is where is stands.... in future posts, I will be documenting the path we travel in handling this.  I am hoping that others on this path will comment with their stories and strategies in coping and dealing with this.  

The first step for a child of a parent in this situation is to realize that there really is something wrong with our parents. With the absence of obvious memory issues, it is easy to push aside our concerns and to rationalize away the issue.  Believe me... I know.  Looking back (thank you, hindsight), we think a lot of these symptoms have been going on for up to a decade.  FTD is a disease that usually start early in the 40-60 age range, but can be found earlier and later.  Early signs are usually misdiagnosed as depression, mid-life crisis, alcoholism (when in fact the disease itself CAUSES excessive drinking).  

The second step is to get involved... I have become a helicopter daughter... I started insinuating myself into his medical appointments.  he fact that he was so 'okay' with me doing that was a warning sign all in itself.

After that, it is all about the diagnosis... and you might have to push to get this done in a timely manner.  In a future post, I will be listing the steps that we took to get to a diagnosis.