Download or read book The Longest Goodbye A Family s Hope Filled Journey Through Alzheimer s written by Shelly Calcagno and published by Ambassador International. This book was released on 2022-11-15 with total page 91 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Are we ever ready to say goodbye? She looked out into the yard sprinkled with spring dandelions. “Yellow flowers,” she said, searching for her words. We knew something wasn’t right. That’s when things began to fall apart for our family, when our longest goodbye journey began—the defining before-and-after moment. And now, looking back, it’s been almost a decade of slow loss and drawn-out grief as we slowly let go of our beautiful mom. In the middle of it all, though, we have learned to look for hope and chase down joy, discovering that, in spite of our pain, there are always gifts to be found, even on the hardest of days. Alzheimer’s disease affects almost fifty million people worldwide. It touches people across every walk of life. So, how do millions of people figure out how to love as they let go? The Longest Goodbye is a collection of stories and moments not just about the clinical side of memory loss–but the emotional heart journey. It is a story that shows how joy and grief are often intertwined and wrapped up together in the glorious mess of life. The Longest Goodbye encourages readers to remember the ones they love while they are still here and to intentionally celebrate and live through the pain and hard days. It’s filled with tears, hope, and bitter-sweet moments all held together by the beautiful love of a mother and daughter holding onto a life filled with memories, while learning to let go and say goodbye.

Download or read book The Long Goodbye written by Keri Kitay and published by Hachette Australia. This book was released on 2024-05-01 with total page 223 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A powerful mix of memoir and hard-earned knowledge, in The Long Goodbye, Keri Kitay charts her family's poignant and devastating journey after their mother was diagnosed with early onset Alzheimer's disease. When Keri Kitay's mother, Terry, was diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer's disease, nothing could have prepared her family for what lay ahead. The diagnosis and the years that followed rocked their world in unimaginable ways. In this powerful mix of memoir and hard-earned knowledge, Keri charts her family's journey: what life was like before Alzheimer's, the early signs that everybody missed, the day they got the shattering news, coming to terms with the grim prognosis . . . and most devastatingly, witnessing the woman they knew and loved slowly fade away. Poignant and moving, The Long Goodbye is a stirring account of losing a parent to the ravages of an unforgiving disease and a heartfelt exploration of what it means to face this with grace and dignity. This is a story about ordinary family ties which became extraordinary through necessity, about unbreakable bonds and unconditional love, and what holds us close even in the most heartbreaking of circumstances. 'A significant resource for anyone faced with dementia' PROFESSOR HENRY BRODATY

Download or read book An Eight Year Goodbye written by Maryanne V. Scott and published by Page Publishing Inc. This book was released on 2021-01-27 with total page 222 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Samuel Valenti was an unpretentious, humble man who required very little in life to make him happy. He grew up during the Great Depression, working on the family farm in New Jersey, growing tomatoes to sell to Campbell Soup Company. Seeing the Hindenburg fly over his farm, receiving visits to the farm from his cousin, Anne Bancroft, and serving his country in World War II were a few of the highlights of his young adult life that he spoke of often. However, marrying the love of his life and having his daughter and son were the basis of what sustained him every day as he lived the American dream of working hard and prospering. Life had always been wonderful for Sam until later in his life when he started to lose his precious memories and abilities to Alzheimer's disease. His slow cognitive decline lasted for eight long years with his children by his side, helping him to navigate through the stages of the disease. An Eight-Year Goodbye is the story of Sam's journey through this debilitating illness with some helpful suggestions from the author on how to handle some of the heartbreaking challenges that Alzheimer's presents. It is also a story of love and compassion as Sam's children watch their father go from the vital, independent, vibrant man that they grew up with to the feeble, confused man who was no longer able to communicate with his family. This story will touch the heart of anyone whose loved one has experienced or is experiencing the long, slow deterioration that Alzheimer's disease brings.

Download or read book The Long Goodbye written by J. Mike Oliver and published by Mike Oliver. This book was released on with total page 45 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "A Long Goodbye" is a deeply emotional and heartfelt novel that follows the journey of Jo Anne, a devoted wife, as she navigates the challenges and heartbreak of her husband Joe’s battle with Alzheimer’s disease. The story captures the essence of love, loss, and resilience through Jo Anne's eyes, painting a vivid picture of her strength and dedication. Jo Anne's life takes a poignant turn as she witnesses Joe's gradual decline, transforming from a vibrant partner to a frail, silent figure. Her unwavering commitment to caring for him—feeding him, changing him, and providing patient companionship—highlights the profound depths of her love. Despite the emotional and physical toll, Jo Anne's spirit remains unbroken, showcasing the resilience of the human heart. Amidst the sorrow, Jo Anne embarks on a journey of self-discovery. A spontaneous trip to Las Vegas offers her a brief escape, where she experiences joy and excitement she hadn't felt in years. This adventure reignites her spirit, reminding her of the importance of living fully despite life's challenges. Throughout the novel, Jo Anne finds solace in the support of old friends, like Sam, Joe’s golf buddy, who offers comfort and reassurance. Their shared experiences of loss and their mutual support provide a lifeline during Jo Anne's darkest moments. The story crescendos in a deeply moving scene where Jo Anne, lying beside Joe, feels his frail body and senses his pain. Her raw emotions and desperate pleas for him to stay are met with silence, culminating in Joe’s peaceful passing. The nurses leave her alone, allowing Jo Anne to grieve and find closure in her own way. "A Long Goodbye" is not just a tale of sorrow but also a testament to the enduring power of love and the human spirit. It is a poignant exploration of how one woman finds strength, hope, and a renewed sense of purpose in the face of profound loss.

Download or read book Jan s Story written by Barry Rex Petersen and published by Behler Publications. This book was released on 2010 with total page 226 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: CBS News correspondent Barry Petersen tells the tender story of his wife's battle with Early Onset Alzheimer's.

Download or read book The Long Goodbye written by Cathy D. Giomblanco and published by Covenant Books, Inc.. This book was released on 2021-11-18 with total page 211 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The title of The Long Good-Bye is just that. This is the story of a wonderful life that was cut short too soon, not in the physical sense but in the mind. A story of a gifted artist who began the slow decline into Alzheimer’s dementia, eventually forgetting who she was and who her loved ones were. This is also a story of the ones who loved her and how they dealt with the progression of her long goodbye. This is the story of a life well lived. This is the story of my mom.

Download or read book I Understand You Forgot to Say Goodbye written by Robert Pace and published by Christian Faith Publishing, Inc.. This book was released on 2018-10-03 with total page 137 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Alzheimer's is devastating to the afflicted person, with no true cure in sight. However, your loved one will need all of the loving care and understanding you can deliver. Using the most of each day as a good point and shaping the now strange world to become just a little bit more manageable for your loved one is key. The challenges presented by the disease itself, the challenges from your hurt feelings, and the challenges of supporting family members as they deal with their feelings could be viewed as way too much to handle. But using some of the reflective items in I Understand . . . You Forgot to Say Goodbye will truly assist you on the journey with your loved one's situation or surely provide key points for a potential future situation you will be involved in with a loved one.

Download or read book Before My Eyes written by Diane Currie and published by iUniverse. This book was released on 2010-03 with total page 90 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Imagine the heart-wrenching devastation that is experienced by a family when a parent is diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease! Author Diane Currie shares her candid and personal reflections about her mother's struggle with this disease as she copes with the reality of the present but always honors the memory of her past. Through a series of moving vignettes, she remains connected with her mother in a creative way as the strong bond between them slowly dissolves as the disease progresses. From the first moment of her mother's diagnosis, Currie conveys in a captivating manner the intense feelings of loss and hopelessness one experiences when dealing with this dreadful disease. She is able to protray the subtle changes in her mother's behavior and personality throughout her decline, all in a deeply human way. While Before My Eyes describes one family's touching and painful journey, in essence Currie's reflective account may typify the Alzheimer's experience, while offering support and validation to all those who walk its arduous path"--Page 4 of cover.

Download or read book Long Good Night written by Simpkins and published by Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing. This book was released on 2003-09-13 with total page 230 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An uplifting story of hope for caregivers everywhere. The Long Good-Night contradicts the prevailing opinion that suffering and chaos are all that is possible during seasons of caring for an aging parent, even one with Alzheimer's disease.

Download or read book The Long Road Called Goodbye written by Charlotte Akin and published by . This book was released on 2000 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Part clinical case study, part family journal, The Long Road Called Goodbye is a powerful and moving account of one family's thirteen-year struggle with Alzheimer's. This engaging informative book is a closly documented clinical study that reads like a novel, filled with all the fellings, crises, and conflicts experienced by patient and family. It is a story of love, loyalty, perservance, strength, and dignity. The Long Road Called Goodbye makes a major contribution to the care of AD patients and their families. The book will be of interest to professionals who work with Alzheimer's patients, including physicians, staff at care-giving facilities, and state agencies, as well as to families who struggle with this disease.

Download or read book Donald S Story written by Gina Moreno Wilson and published by AuthorHouse. This book was released on 2013-02-15 with total page 163 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: With heart-wrenching honesty, Donalds Story chronicles the last days and years of one familys drama through the hell which is Alzheimers dementia. This story will make you cry, make you laugh, and make you think. Its a must read for anyone who will ever get old particularly for anyone who may one day be a caregiver, an AD patient, or a supportive family member of the same. The suffering wreaked from terminal dementia is a saga which is becoming all too familiar. As the 6th leading cause of death in the U.S., Alzheimers and related dementing illnesses are epidemic. How do you survive this disease which robs you of your very self? How do you survive watching someone you love slip away? Complete with "AD Survival Tips", Donalds Story is not just a memoir. It is also a planning tool and a survival guide for dementia families, providing a roadmap through the tangled darkness. Still, despite the subject matter, this memoir is not wholly dark. How could it be when it is first and foremost a love story? Loving deeply and forever may render us vulnerable to pain, but therein lies the meaning of life. When all is said and done, Donalds Story is most purely a reminder of just how precious life is.

Download or read book The Long Goodbye written by Judy Bodenheimer and published by Author House. This book was released on 2011-04-19 with total page 126 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: About the Book We all have very special memories of our daddy. He was the first man we ever loved and we did everything we could possibly do to make sure he was cared for. For nine months we did a rotation and stayed with him and kept him at home until it was no longer physically possible. We stood together and made the decision to place him in an Alzheimers facility. We fought every battle we could for him. We loved him physically and emotionally until the last breath that he took. He took us on a journey that we never dreamed we would go. We laughed, loved and cried more than anyone can imagine. We made friends with many people over our journey and now our journey has come to an end. For those who are facing this journey, know that you are not alone. Reach out for help and make friends with those who are walking in the same shoes. Know that those of us who have been there understand your hurt and your pain. These are our stories regarding our journey with our daddy through his nine year battle with Alzheimers. Our hope is to help those who are now faced with the same journey. There will be days of happiness and sunshine embrace these days and let them sustain you through the darker days and always know that you will never walk alone.

Download or read book The Long Goodbye written by Patti Davis and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2005-09-27 with total page 225 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Genuine and heartfelt."—San Diego Union-Tribune Ronald Reagan’s daughter writes with a moving openness about losing her father to Alzheimer’s disease. The simplicity with which she reveals the intensity, the rush, the flow of her feelings encompasses all the surprises and complexities that ambush us when death gradually, unstoppably invades life. In this moving and illuminating portrait of a woman and her father, Patti Davis describes saying goodbye in stages, helpless against the onslaught of a disease that steals what is most precious—a person’s memory. “Alzheimer’s,” she writes, “snips away at the threads, a slow unraveling, a steady retreat; as a witness all you can do is watch, cry, and whisper a soft stream of goodbyes.” She writes of needing to be reunited at forty-two with her mother, of regaining what they had spent decades demolishing. A truce was necessary to bring together a splintered family, a few weeks before her father released his letter telling the country and the world of his illness. She delves into her memories to touch her father again, to hear his voice, to keep alive the years she had with him.

Download or read book Floating in the Deep End How Caregivers Can See Beyond Alzheimer s written by Patti Davis and published by Liveright Publishing. This book was released on 2021-09-28 with total page 185 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: With the heartfelt prose of a loving daughter, Patti Davis provides a life raft for the caregivers of Alzheimer’s patients. “For the decade of my father’s illness, I felt as if I was floating in the deep end, tossed by waves, carried by currents, but not drowning,” writes Patti Davis in this searingly honest and deeply moving account of the challenges involved in taking care of someone stricken with Alzheimer’s. When her father, the fortieth president of the United States, announced his Alzheimer’s diagnosis in an address to the American public in 1994, the world had not yet begun speaking about this cruel, mysterious disease. Yet overnight, Ronald Reagan and his immediate family became the face of Alzheimer’s, and Davis, once content to keep her family at arm’s length, quickly moved across the country to be present during “the journey that would take [him] into the sunset of [his] life.” Empowered by all she learned from caring for her father—about the nature of the illness, but also about the loss of a parent—Davis founded a support group for the family members and friends of Alzheimer’s patients. Along with a medically trained cofacilitator, she met with hundreds of exhausted and devastated attendees to talk through their pain and confusion. While Davis was aware that her own circumstances were uniquely fortunate, she knew there were universal truths about dementia, and even surprising gifts to be found in a long goodbye. With Floating in the Deep End, Davis draws on a welter of experiences to provide a singular account of battling Alzheimer’s. Eloquently woven with personal anecdotes and helpful advice tailored specifically for the overlooked caregiver, this essential guide covers every potential stage of the disease from the initial diagnosis through the ultimate passing and beyond. Including such tips as how to keep a loved one hygienic, and careful responses for when they drift to a time gone by, Davis always stresses the emotional milestones that come with slow-burning grief. Along the way, Davis shares how her own fractured family came together. With unflinching candor, she recalls when her mother, Nancy, who for decades could not show her children compassion or vulnerability, suddenly broke down in her arms. Davis also offers tender moments in which her father, a fabled movie star whom she always longed to know better, revealed his true self—always kind, even when he couldn’t recognize his own daughter. An inherently wise work that promises to become a classic, Floating in the Deep End ultimately provides hope to struggling families while elegantly illuminating the fragile human condition.

Download or read book The Long Journey Home written by David Burgess and published by Christian Faith Publishing, Inc.. This book was released on 2023-02-09 with total page 60 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: InA The Long Journey Home, Pastor Burgess who, with his wife Carol, invited people to journey with them on tours to various locations in the world, now invites you and me to join them in their final tour, as Carol takesA The Long Journey HomeA with Pastor Burgess right by her side all the way home. Discover what he means as he comments in his book, aEURoeNo matter how much we try to prepare for the loss of a loved one, we should expect our souls to hurt, perhaps even to the point of devastation,aEUR yet aEURoethere is a living hope even in the darkest moments of our lives. Join Pastor Burgess onA The Long Journey HomeA as CarolaEUR(tm)s husband, caregiver, friend, and pastor as he discovers a deeper kind of love for Carol that he never knew as it grew and blossomed from a aEURoeliving faith and hopeaEUR in the promises of a loving God. The truths you will learn on this journey will bless you so that you too can be a greater blessing in the lives of your loved ones. aEUR"Rev. Galen Gruelke, officiating pastor at CarolaEUR(tm)s funeral and intermentSuch a heartwarming story! A must read. The author tenderly takes us on a journey through his wifeaEUR(tm)s devastating diagnosis to their final goodbye. This story is meant for you if youaEUR(tm)re in a committed relationship or if you are a person of faith. aEUR"Suzanne Williams, with her daughter Erinne, introduced in chapter 12

Download or read book The Long Goodbye written by Margaret R. Miles and published by Wipf and Stock Publishers. This book was released on 2017-02-02 with total page 104 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Long Goodbye: Dementia Diaries discusses a disease that is both personal and social for more than five million patients and their families and friends in the United States today. Now that there are medical strategies for preventing and/or curing strokes, heart attacks, even cancer, many more people are going to live into the dementia years in the near future. Although many dementia horror stories circulate in conversation and in the media, they are not the whole story. Creative approaches to loving a dementia patient can make for a valuable learning experience for family and caregivers. In The Long Goodbye Margaret Miles describes her commitment to making--rather than passively suffering--her spouse's dementia experience. Family and friends who accompany patients find embedded in the experience moments of great beauty, hilariously funny incidents, new companions, and life insights. The narrative provides both a travelogue and suggestions for a richly meaningful life passage for all participants. The Long Goodbye seeks to supply a balanced picture of a disease usually represented as unmitigated loss.

Download or read book The Long Road to Goodbye written by Floyd Fought and published by Pleasant Word. This book was released on 2007-10-23 with total page 116 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When Floyd Fought’s wife was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s, the newly-retired couple’s future was thrown into confusion and chaos. In this book, Fought recounts their pilgrimage through Alzheimer’s and offers practical, creative techniques for coping with the demands of in-home caregiving.