Fear of Memory Loss

Warning: This is a controversial piece.

Forgetting

I'm at that age where you start to worry about things like memory loss, forgetting things, going downstairs or upstairs, in another room, and thinking "What? Why am I here? What did I come in here for?" And having to retrace your steps.

Now I know that happens to people at any age. And it's not a big thing, but when you add them all together and then you start to see people around being diagnosed with the big A, you do think about Alzheimer's.

Of course, their last week is forty years ago.

Did you forget your keys because you're just getting older? Did you lose that bank card because it just fell out of your pocket? I haven't put shoes in the fridge or the butter under the bed. But we do worry don’t we? We worry.

The theory is that as you get older, your brain is unable to hold to new memories, but it retains the old memories. The analogy is that of a bookshelf that’s rocking and all the books at the top of the shelf fall off, while the ones at the bottom remain in place. Apparently.

You know, I've been a bit naughty

This means you’ll remember people from 30 or 40 years ago, or in childhood, but not what you had for breakfast. You won't remember what day it is. But what happens to the choices we've made in our lives? When we reach that point of only remembering what happened 40 years ago. Imagine you're sitting with someone, and they say to you. “Oh by the way, last week I killed the woman next door. Someone else got the blame for it. And I buried them At 26 Morris Lane, Brinkley, HE10. 5KY.”

Of course, their last week is forty years ago.

“And that's not all I did.” they’ll continue. “Yesterday I killed Patsy, that girl with the lisp. She kept purposely clicking her shoes every time she saw me. It was driving me crazy. I chopped her up and fed to the poodles at Number 13. I never told anyone.”

So yes, imagine that you're sitting with someone and they start to talk about things like that. We don't mind things like, “Oh yes, it was me who had the last slice of cake at my cousins birthday party? Yes, I swore to the library that I’d returned their book, but the truth is fifty years later, it's still on my bookshelf. I also took some paper clips from work and a stack of photocopying paper.”

Those things are standard for most people; they're par for the course. But what if you forget life-changing decisions? For example, identifying now as a different sex. Does your biological brain revert back to the original? Or does the brain naturally see your new identity as what you were meant to be? So now finally you can be happy. Except you don't know damn thing about it 'cause you've forgotten?

So who's that person in the mirror?

But what if you wake up one day and your brain has set itself back to your first sex which you’d forgotten. So when you look into the mirror, what you see is a nightmare: the body of a man when you’re a woman, or vice-versa.

What if you can remember being sighted and now can’t see. Or you were blind and have since had a procedure to help you see? You’re in a wheelchair – or a double amputee. I think the saddest thing would be that you gave all your assets away to the person who abused you the most, who’d taken as much as they could take and left. Then they return and you’d forgotten everything they’d already done.

What if you only remember the baby you gave away at 19 and not the six children you’ve had since then with the man you met and married?

Because the media only wants to focus on how many jewels a celebrity is wearing, we don’t get to learn about these issues, some of which will be the reality. You can only hope for one friend who cares about you – and it’s not always the one you think. But life is cruel. Perhaps dementia is the kindest way to end our days. And look – there goes a flying pig.