Subtitle: A Memoir
Recommended to me by: a friend
Wendy Mitchell is a vibrant, strong, smart woman, proud of her memory, her home renovations, and her two now-adult daughters whom she raised on her own. At age 57, she starts to feel fatigued and confused, and falls unexpectedly several times while running.
She has what appears to be a small stroke, and is diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer’s soon afterward at age 58. She is determined to remain independent as long as possible and uses multiple alarms on her iPad throughout her day to remind her to do tasks like make food, and then eat the food she made.
After being forced to retire from her beloved NHS job for ill health, she becomes an activist for people with dementia, participating in research and giving talks on her experience. She has to write out her talks in advance, map out her travels by public transit, and print photos of where she’ll be staying.
The book is absorbing on the level of getting to know Wendy and her story, as well as on the level of learning more about the effects of Alzheimer’s and how to live well after being diagnosed.
Highly recommended.
She wrote two books after this one and kept a blog, Which Me Am I Today.
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