Young Onset Dementia - Keith Oliver's Story

my name is Keith Oliver I'm 56 years of age I was a head teacher of a large Primary School in Canterbury where I'd been head for 11 years and this was part of a career which had spend 35 years in education as a teacher and as local education Authority adviser [Music] about 2 and 1 half years ago I experienced a series of unexplained Falls I'm feeling wobbly as if I was walking on a boat all the time and uh felt much greater fatigue and generally speaking had a feeling of being on well we thought perhaps it was an ear infection so I went to the GP who uh examined my ears and said there was no sign of an infection but gave me antibiotics just in case I took the course of antibiotics then there was no difference no no improvement so we went back to the doctor who did it some further investigation uh with my balance and asked me some various questions about my health generally and sent me for an MRI scan an appointment was then rushed through to see the neurologist to get the results of the scan I didn't suspect anything didn't think anything more of it and he rather out of the blue said to my wife and and myself that he suspected that the scan suggested uh that it could be early signs of dementia uh which had not previously been mentioned by the GP or by anyone else and wasn't really on our radar so it was a shock we came away from that appointment with the uh neurologist shaken but determined to see things through and clung in a sense to the point that at this stage it was only suspected it was it was um nothing was confirmed it was a suggestion that it could be dementia amongst the early symptoms which I experienced were difficulties at work with regards to meeting deadlines which previously hadn't been a problem as a head teacher I'd always operated with an open door policy and had been very easy with multitasking and and so on and so forth that became a severe problem I was was finding that I could only concentrate on one thing at one time um answering the phone became a challenge retrieving information was becoming difficult and retaining information not memory as such that came a little bit later it was more taking information in and then bringing it to my fingertips later things were becoming more difficult generally speaking and uh I had to confide also in in colleagues close colleagues at school because I was determined on I wanted to carry on working for as long as I possibly could um so the deputy was brought into my confidence the secretary was brought into my confidence but no one else because at this stage it was still very early in the investigation as well and nothing was confirmed I managed to carry on working until the end of the summer term which I was pleased about Rosemary used to come up my wife used to come collect me from work some lunchtimes and we'd go offsite and have something to eat and I'd have a snooze in the car and then go back to work in the afternoon so all these things were happening and and stuff were getting concerned there was a clear raising of anxiety in the school around my health but no one one knew what the situation was apart from the two or three people who ID confided in we then had the summer holiday and during that time I reflected upon my position and realized that it was untenable um and start of the uh September term I went in for two days because I was determined to start the new year off with staff and children and to open the school up and then seeing the GP he signed me off for two months which in turn became six months at the end of which uh diagnosis was confirmed and um on April the 1st uh my career of 35 years in teaching came to a close [Music] people do ask me that people ask how how does the dementia affect you now and I suppose one way of describing it is to to use the analogy of the weather most days are are sunny days for me and I maintain a clear Outlook and life is pretty good but other days it's a bit cloudy and I will come in and out of being able to function effectively there are a few days where the fog descends and um they're not good days and and one way that that shows itself in me is is is word retrieval um when it's a sunny day I can hold a conversation with very little difficulty um on a foggy day finding those words is is a real challenge there are times when I feel isolated in a conversation being part of a conversation with more than one person is often challenging having to listen to two or three people talking at one time in any group of uh group discussion is very difficult it's easier on a oneto one but if maybe there's five or six of us talking even if it's just general chitchat in the family it's difficult to follow it uh and one can easily become isolated in that situation and withdrawn and disengaged from what's going on background noise is often a challenge um I find find filtering it out quite difficult um if if I'm talking to somebody and there's a radio program on or something I can't I can't cope with the conversation with that background noise watching television for me is is one of the ways in which I I do relax but following story lines is also quite difficult in there I do find it difficult to absorb what's happening and who's saying what to whom and uh I do often have have to ask my wife to tell me you know because I've missed space although I've been looking at the screen it hasn't gone in uh I've not absorbed the dialogue but there's a counter sight that as well because often in the summer there's lots of repeats on the television and for me repeats are new because I've got no recall if haven't seen them before even if I did so every cloud has a silver lining I guess I do also use the computer and um I I do email to friends I do research on the computer I always have done uh I used to be reasonably proficient on the computer but it's become more frustrating in recent times I'm much slower on the computer and some of the um skills I used to have uh do now come and go um and typing long emails is much more draining than it used to be something I've noticed particularly in the last five or six months is that um there's been a heightening of my emotions when engaged with either a book or a film or TV program or a piece of music which previously I would perhaps have had an emotional attachment to and enjoyed but now I read a book which which may touch my soul or watch a film that's that's got an emotional uh kick to it and and you know I'm in floods of Tears so I'm less able Now to control that than than I used to be and I I I have noticed that I feel I have a a window of opportunity if you like to speak to people about demena and to feel as though I can make a contribution towards raising public awareness I think one reason why my health has uh maintained at a reasonably good level since being diagnosed is my determination to try and live life positively to do things which I enjoy and find interesting and to live life to the full which enables me to remain as well as possible

Channel: DementiaTraining

Views: 181,464

Keywords: Dementia, Alzheimer's, Keith Oliver, young onset dementia, early onset dementia, younger people with dementia

Id: CPulwcrkcxA

Length: 8min 59sec (539 seconds)

Published: Sun Apr 28 2013