Aunt With Alzheimer's

I've never posted on this board before but I am on several other boards on HW.

I talked to my 84 year old aunt today for the first time in about a year. I knew she had alzheimers but did not expect her to be so mixed up. I have cried ever since I got off the phone with her.

She kept going back and forth from the past to the present and she was crying because she had not seen me in a long time and was happy to hear my voice.

She thought we were both much younger and didn't remember anything about my being ill with CFS so I told her I just had the flu. I really didn't know what to say to keep her from getting upset.

I am devastated that she is so out of it and my uncle said this was one of the more positive conversations that shes had recently. She did not want to hang up because she was afraid she'd never hear my voice again. I told my uncle to call me for her when she was up to having another talk.

I didn't know it would be like this. I'm so sorry for all the folks and their loved ones that are going through this horrible disease. I had no idea it was so awful. Thank you for letting me vent.

Thanks for the reply. I tried not to talk about anything negative and to go along with what she was remembering. I don't see her anymore because we don't live in the same state and I'm too ill to travel.

She had her 84th birthday on Monday but couldn't remember that when I asked about her bday party so I just let it go. She asked me why I hadn't visited her and I mentioned that I was too ill to travel. This upset her, she didn't recall anything about my illness so I just told her I had the flu.

She laughed when I told her I was 77 years old and I realized she thought we were still young. I feel so bad for her.

It's so sad. I could hear that it bothered her a lot when I talked about our age or our children's ages. I had told her that my oldest daughter, who is 58, had a hip replacement surgery but she said that couldn't be because she was too young to have that done.

This was before I realized how she was thinking. I do want to continue to talke to her but I don't really know which subjects to avoid. I guess I'll just take it one conversation at a time.