Alzheimer's Disease and Disorientation Difficulties
The confusing and upsetting feelings of disorientation are
extremely common in Alzheimer's disease and can cause patient's
to forget who and where they are.
Not knowing your name or address or the correct day or month is
a very common symptom that helps define the disease, as such
feelings are closely connected with a person's memory or the
ability to remember.
The nature of the memory loss can be very deceptive as gradually
little things disappear from the sufferer's memory almost
unnoticed for weeks or months even by those closest to the
patient.
A sufferer may look around them puzzled as they are not sure
where they are, even though they may be in familiar
surroundings. They may forget your name or birthdays.
Gradually the symptoms will get worse as the disease becomes
more severe.
Patients will forget the correct month, become unsure of the
days of the week or even forget what their own name is.
Eventually their memory loss will become so severe they remain
in a constant state of disorientation and confusion.
It's not uncommon for an Alzheimer's patient to get so confused
that they travel to a home they lived in 30 years or so
previously.
By this stage their short term memory is so dysfunctional, and
has been replaced with their long term memories, that they no
longer remember that they moved away from that house.
Other patients can suffer severe problems if, for example,
English is a second language.
As their memory is lost to the effects of Alzheimer's disease
they can lose the ability to speak or understand others speaking
in their adopted language.
Eventually even their ability to read, write and converse is
lost and the Alzheimer's sufferer can be forced to retreat into
their own little world.