As I’ve said before and so has others, you will never know unless you have this disease. It sucks! Nothing I can say other than that.

Those are not my words. They are the words of someone with younger-onset Alzheimer’s. Her name is Melanie and she is in her early 40’s. I read the blogs of many individuals with dementia, but there is something about her blog that keeps drawing me in. I think it’s because when I look at her picture I see someone who looks like they might hang out with my group of friends if they lived in my town.

I want Melanie and others who share their raw and personal experiences with dementia to know that what they are doing is meaningful. Instead of reading my words today, I want you to read her words. You will learn much more about dementia from her in 15 minutes than you ever can from me.

You can read her most recent post (which I’ve read about ten times in the last week) here:

https://mwagner21.wordpress.com/2015/06/09/the-end/

Thank you, Melanie. You are making a difference.