Mom & Me Four Archive

    I'm currently looking up medical terms used in an article sent to me by the author of The Yellow Wallpaper. It's from Annals of Internal Medicine and can be downloaded and accessed for free in pdf format as Nun Study.
    Many of you may have heard of the study, as it has been mentioned in a variety of sources throughout the years. I vaguely recall hearing about it some time ago. In a nutshell: The study continues to follow 678 nuns, an extremely homogeneous population, since 1992. All the women participating in the study have allowed their brains to be examined after death. This particular article briefly and lightly focuses on the preponderance of dementia within the population and some of the results for a few of the sisters' brain examinations after death, correlating them with clinical measurements of dementia throughout their participation in the study.
    Although my investigation of and thinking about the article and study are only in early stages, I want to record some of my initial impressions and thoughts here for my own further access and whatever interest they may be to my readers:

• I'm especially interested in the often mentioned involvement of the lower left anterior quadrant of the brain, as this is where my mother's mini-stroke occurred, which is probably what set off the development of her dementia. Apparently, this part of the brain is involved in language skills, which, oddly, seems to have lesser involvement in my mother's dementia than should be expected.
• Of course, we won't know much about her neuropathy until she dies. She's donated her body to science so there is a fair to good chance that her brain will be autopsied. I wonder if I'll be able to get a rundown of her results.
• As well, I've noted that the article focuses briefly on the possibility that a nutrient rich diet, especially rich in folic acid, might help one resist cognitive impairment despite the existence of physical neuropathy. I note with wonder that my mother has been been a vitamin and supplement freak from middle adulthood on.
  • So, however, was her mother, the grandmother who was afflicted with severe dementia; my mother picked up the dietary supplement habit from her mother.
  • As well, my grandfather, who, according to this article probably suffered from mild dementia, hardly noticeable "in polite company", was notorious for eating mostly refined carbohydrates most of his life [a short description of which can be found here and here.] and considered his wife's habit of vitamin and mineral supplements a waste of money.
    • My mother, for significant portions of her life, not including her marriage and the raising of her children, has indulged herself in the same diet. It is only within the last six years that her diet has incorporated much fewer refined carbohydrates, a much higher amount of fresh fruits and vegetables, high amounts of uncured meats and significantly lower amounts of -ose laden condiments.
  • Their other daughter also developed pronounced dementia. In her case, it was documented and speculated early on that her dementia was a result of severe, long term malnutrition caused by advanced, long term alcoholism. Later, however, she was diagnosed as afflicted with Alzheimer's. It is also true, from my observation, though, that her dementia plateaued (at a much high level of disfunction than my mother's) after she was in a position where she could no longer drink and was treated to a balanced diet.
• It is also interesting for me to note that that the nuns were and are, it seems, all teachers, as was my mother, and the mother of the author of The Yellow Wallpaper. I'm not sure that this is significant, but it's provocative for me to consider.
• From what I know of my mother's dementia, I'm guessing that her brain has been able to resist, for whatever reason, some of the expressions of dementia that are inherent in her causes and has not been able to resist others.
• The article briefly notes the possibility that brain "exercise" could have a salutary effect on the lack of demential development. From my observations of my mother, I'm not convinced of this and consider this to be more of a pie-in-the-sky hope at this time. I've noted before in this journal and comments to another that although my mother continues to do crosswords (during which she indulges in a lot of cheating, which she's always done), reads a lot, all kinds of material, continues to enjoy wry discussions and is nobody's fool when it comments to ironic and cynical commentary, I have no evidence that any of these "exercises" is responsible for her long term demential plateau and tend to doubt this possibility. The only aspect of her life that I think might have some effect on her ability to remain at a plateau might be that she lives with someone (me) who pays a lot of attention to her and expects her to respond to this attention. I am willing to admit, though, that this might also be a pie-in-the-sky consideration.

    The article does not include comparison with any (probably very few in existence at this time) studies of other populations or the population in general. Thus, it makes no apologies for it's lack of conclusions. It was sent to me in response to my wonderings, a few posts previous, about dementia, especially among people who follow spiritual disciplines.

Comment that couldn't be posted while Blogger's been down:
Gail--I've just read your post of today. One thing that pops into my mind immediately is a recent theory that Alzheimer's and diabetes are linked. I think this is based mostly on the observation that cholesterol-lowering meds also seem to ameliorate the dementia. I wonder if it's really true, and if it's connected with dementia caused by strokes or Parkinson's? My mother was never diagnosed with diabetes but was on cholesterol-lowering meds for many, many years. Interestingly, her (previous) GP suddenly took her off them because her liver function readings were high. Looking back, I do think the dementia symptoms preceded his taking her off the meds, but now that I think of it, right afterwards was when we started noticing symptoms we could not ignore. Her diet has always been heavy on the carbs. If I weren't here she'd eat cookies and candy all the time. And my mother's physical health is excellent--she's not even on blood pressure medication.
posted by Deb Peterson on 6/08/06 @ 18:55

Response to comment that couldn't be posted while Blogger's been down:
In response to your comment above, you've given me the idea of a memory rundown, probably using the journals, comparing the control of her diabetes and her dementia at any given time.
I do know that prior to being, once again, diagnosed as diabetic and deciding to take it as seriously as she could, I often wrote about her sugar daze. Later, after the essay to which the previous link refers was written, I remember mentioning, probably in the histories somewhere, that her doctor of the time mentioned that her what I call her "sugar daze" would lift. I remember being relieved that he immediately understood to what I was refering with that phrase; it must, I figured, be a common phenomenon.
This, however, took place in 2000. By April of 1997 I was conducting all her life business, except collecting her tax stuff, which I undertook the following year, because of her dementia.
I also know, from blood tests residing with her previous doctor, that she was indeed not diabetic in 1997, 1998 or most of 1999. It developed within a six month period and began to show in the latter half of 1999. She, however, decided, for a year, not to have the pills refilled and to ignore it. That wasn't dementia, that was orneriness: She constantly talked about that physician having diagnosed her as diabetic, giving her a pretty sturdy regimen of glucophage, the now famous advice, "You can eat all the popcorn and peanuts you want" and sending her home. In the early summer of 2000, though, my mother developed a raging bladder infection. She refused to go back to the same doctor, who she knew was going to scold her for not controlling her diabetes, not believing she had it. After spending day after day washing her bed and her chair cushions in her wake because she had absolutely no control over her bladder (this was before she needed Depends) I found a geriatrician and set her up for the appointment about to take place when I wrote an essay about her sugar daze.
posted by Gail Rae on 6/24/06 @ 23:40

Comment that couldn't be posted while Blogger's been down:
Another idea I've been mulling over regarding dementia and spiritual practice--I've had a few discussions with my clique at work about Medieval mystics (Teresa of Avila, Catherine of Siena), and how we in this day and age would probably just put them on thorazine to "cure" this. The psychosis of one age might be the mysticism of another. Closer to our situation--there's a famous Medieval text called "The Booke of Margery Kempe" and Kempe is not so much a mystic as she is driven by what are seen as troubling convictions. I wonder if that might be analogous to dementia? What I'm thinking is--aside from psychopathic, sociopathic behavior--so-called "mental illness" is mostly the mirror image of the norm. Whatever the "norm" is. I'm not saying that it's ALL relative, but I'd be interested in hearing the ideas of a culture that values its Ancients, like Native American culture. And Buddhist--as far as I know the Chinese and other Asian groups are more respectful in general of their oldest members. So maybe in this roundabout way, spiritual/cultural settings have an effect on what is considered dementia??
posted by Deb Peterson on 6/08/06 @ 18:55