What it’s like to have dementia
POURING coffee into her handbag and using toothpaste for soap – this is what it’s like to have dementia.
Life can be a puzzling struggle for 65-year-old Christine Karanges but she’s determined to live the best she can no matter what the disease does to her.
She helps raise money for dementia charities and even spent four years writing a book about her experiences with dementia.
“I was diagnosed when I was 58,” the mother of 10 says.
“I knew there was something wrong with me but the mental health clinic thought I was crazy.
“I was losing myself, getting off at the wrong bus stop, trying to pay people at the shop when I’d already paid them, pouring coffee in my handbag, putting my keys on the bin.
“Once, I even washed myself with toothpaste.”
Ms Karanges looks after herself with a little help from one of her children and a part-time carer who helps her with housework and takes her shopping.
She said she was determined to avoid moving
into a nursing home.
“I went into an aged-care home when I was 60 but after 18 months I nearly did the unthinkable – I nearly took my own life,” Ms Karanges said.
“Now I live in my own unit.
“I don’t want to go back to the home but it’s getting to the stage where my health issues mean I might have no choice.”
Before then though, Ms
Karanges says she’s got her heart set on ticking a few things off her bucket list – going to Grafton’s Jacaranda Festival and Toowoomba’s Carnival of Flowers.
“I was always a keen gardener,” she says.
Her book, Tears and Laughter of Dementia and Alzheimer’s: The Christine Karanges Story, may be available from your library.