Fading Angel: A Chronicle of Love

Rating:
Summary: Fading Angel
Review: Fading Angel gets right to the heart and soul of familes with Althzeimers. It gives you insight to what the family feels seeing their loved one(s) going thru the disease. Just as importantly it gives you insight to help with the everyday life of an althzeimers patient and keeping them at home.

The author gives you helpful ideas as to ways to help pay for the care and how to get care, and forms to help write to your congressmen.

A very helpful book for families for althzeimers families

Colleen

Rating:
Summary: Fading Angel
Review: Fading Angel gets right to the heart and soul of familes with Althzeimers. It gives you insight to what the family feels seeing their loved one(s) going thru the disease. Just as importantly it gives you insight to help with the everyday life of an althzeimers patient and keeping them at home.

The author gives you helpful ideas as to ways to help pay for the care and how to get care, and forms to help write to your congressmen.

A very helpful book for families for althzeimers families

Colleen

Rating:
Summary: LOVE IS THE KEY
Review: Fading Angel was a sad journey into the land of the aging for me. I personally know the author who is my first cousin and her Mom was my Aunt Alice. I knew Aunt Alice as a happy, bouncy, highly intelligent woman who loved her life and family. In Aunt Alice's late 40's, she enrolled in classes to upgrade her secretarial skills; she learned how to type and perform office work. She landed a job as the secretary to the Fire Chief in her city. I had little contact with Sande and Aunt Alice for almost 30 years so imagine my surprize and horror when I read Sande's book, Fading Angel!!

I have read and re-read the book countless times. I've shed many tears, but always come to the same conclusion. The key is to treat the Alzheimer patient with the same respect you had shown them all their lives... be consistent, patient, assuring and constantly show the patient they are loved. The author shares with us that she assured her Mother over and over that they would be together no matter what. My admiration and respect for Sande is limitless as she takes us down the long path to devastation of the mind which Alzheimers victims will endure.

This book is one to share with a loved one who is aging. Senior citizens who are unsure and fear their fate may find some hope and consolation in Sande's well-written paragraphs. Caregivers will find her book especially helpful in "lining up their ducks".

As I live in the State of Florida which has a vast senior citizen population, I was honored to present Sande's book to two Alzheimer Support Groups here on the Space Coast. I have also donated a copy of Fading Angel to our local library in my Aunt Alice's memory. My sister, who lives in northern Wisconsin, has done the same.

Wonderful job, Sande, and a tribute to your Mom, my Aunt Alice, who will always be ageless in my memory.

Rating:
Summary: LOVE IS THE KEY
Review: Fading Angel was a sad journey into the land of the aging for me. I personally know the author who is my first cousin and her Mom was my Aunt Alice. I knew Aunt Alice as a happy, bouncy, highly intelligent woman who loved her life and family. In Aunt Alice's late 40's, she enrolled in classes to upgrade her secretarial skills; she learned how to type and perform office work. She landed a job as the secretary to the Fire Chief in her city. I had little contact with Sande and Aunt Alice for almost 30 years so imagine my surprize and horror when I read Sande's book, Fading Angel!!

I have read and re-read the book countless times. I've shed many tears, but always come to the same conclusion. The key is to treat the Alzheimer patient with the same respect you had shown them all their lives... be consistent, patient, assuring and constantly show the patient they are loved. The author shares with us that she assured her Mother over and over that they would be together no matter what. My admiration and respect for Sande is limitless as she takes us down the long path to devistation of the mind an Alzheimers victim will endure.

This book is one to share with a loved one who is aging. Senior citizens who are unsure and fear their fate may find some hope and consolation in Sande's well-written paragraphs. Caregivers will find her book especially helpful in "lining up their ducks".

As I live in the State of Florida which has a vast senior citizen population, I was honored to present Sande's book to two Alzheimer Support Groups here on the Space Coast. I have also donated a copy of Fading Angel to our local library in my Aunt Alice's memory. My sister, who lives in northern Wisconsin, has done the same.

Wonderful job, Sande, and a tribute to your Mom, my Aunt Alice, who will always be ageless in my memory.

Rating:
Summary: Magnificant
Review: I have had an opportunity to read Fading Angel's. I personnally know the author which made it even more touching to read her book. Well, good isn't the word. It is Magnificant tribute to her mother. The beauty of this book is that this really would help prepare yourself for what lies ahead if one of your family members was stricken with this disease. It is a book anyone could pick up and learn much about the disease and life itself. Life throws us curve balls all the time, it is how we handle them and get through them. Be prepared to laugh and cry at the same time with this book. Each chapter teaches you a little bit more of how to prepare and cope through some of the tough times. What I enjoyed most is that it is not clinical nature, but true to life and very personal, but also trying to share to all us readers that this is LIFE.

ENJOY!

Rating:
Summary: A "Must Read" for Families Dealing with Alzheimer's Disease
Review: I read this book in one day! It provides valuable insight into the world of an Alzheimer's patient and their family. A truly wonderful story of the author's experience using love, compassion and patience while caring for her mother at home. This book is a must-read for anyone facing the challenge of watching a loved one deteriorate with this disease. Practical suggestions are provided on how the patient can be cared for at home and avoid the expense and sterilility of institutional care. Ms. Donahue tells it like it is and shares the many life lessons she was able to learn from her "Fading Angel".

Rating:
Summary: A "Must Read" for Families Dealing with Alzheimer's Disease
Review: I read this book in one day! It provides valuable insight into the world of an Alzheimer's patient and their family. A truly wonderful story of the author's experience using love, compassion and patience while caring for her mother at home. This book is a must-read for anyone facing the challenge of watching a loved one deteriorate with this disease. Practical suggestions are provided on how the patient can be cared for at home and avoid the expense and sterilility of institutional care. Ms. Donahue tells it like it is and shares the many life lessons she was able to learn from her "Fading Angel".

Rating:
Summary: Loving Preparations and Care for Alzheimer's Victims
Review: Yesterday, my 85 year-old Father called to tell me about his younger brother who appears to have Alzheimer's. My uncle had gotten up at 1 a.m., dressed, and announced to my aunt that he was heading out to go fishing. As you can imagine, hearing a story like that both opens up your heart and gives you a tiny smile.

As Fading Angel points out, you need to cherish such moments. They mostly come in the beginning of the disease, and it's all downhill from there.

Ms. Donahue has a powerful story to tell, in relating what she has learned in her voyage through helping her Mom through 14 years of the disease relying on at-home care. I hope that every relative and friend of Alzheimer's victims will read and learn from this book. It's a story about using the heart and the mind to create a better life for everyone.

Unlike most book's about Alzheimer's patients which focus on the disease, or "managing" the patients, this one empathizes with the afflicted as well as their care givers. People with Alzheimer's know that there's something wrong with them, and it makes them feel anxious. This book is filled with loving suggestions for dealing with that anxiety, as well as building a new relationship with the ill person.

Lead with love and compassion, and it seems to work better for everyone involved. I loved reading about Ms. Donahue's many ideas for activities for her Mom that helped her feel needed and participating.

I was even more impressed with the material in the book on how to prepare for the consequences of Alzheimer's. There are legal, financial, and care-giving decisions to be made. There are resources that need to be mustered. And you have to do all of this while being overwhelmed with the consequences disease itself. People start by forgetting names. Pretty soon, they have trouble remembering where they are or what they just did. This book opens with Ms. Donahue's Mom wanting to have pie and coffee, and forgetting that they had just finished doing so five minutes earlier.

Ms. Donahue also makes a powerful case for middle class families getting more financial help from the federal government for at-home care. Her solutions for finding help with care-giving are very inspired and inspiring!

The limitation of reading any single book about the experience with Alzheimer's is that the consequences of each person's affliction will differ. I suggest that you also read Ms. Jacqueline Marcell's book, Elder Rage, to see what it can be like to care for an aggressive Father who is suffering from the disease.

The strength of a case history like this one is that it opens up the details and the pain in a way that statistics can never capture. You will be helping someone whom you love, probably a parent or spouse, and they will just slip away from you. As Ms. Donahue points out, it's not just like taking care of a two-year old. Two-year olds can learn and remember.

The one thing that this book did not address is the recently published research (in Aging with Grace) on the brains of those who did and did not have Alzheimer's. Having a great deal of mental stimulation in your life will stave-off the onset of the symptoms. Those with more education, people who work with ideas, readers, and especially teachers can help themselves to some extent. Until more research is conducted, this may be the most we can do.

Perform all the parts of your life with grace, love, and compassion!

Rating:
Summary: Loving Preparations and Care for Alzheimer's Victims
Review: Yesterday, my 85 year-old Father called to tell me about his younger brother who appears to have Alzheimer's. My uncle had gotten up at 1 a.m., dressed, and announced to my aunt that he was heading out to go fishing. As you can imagine, hearing a story like that both opens up your heart and gives you a tiny smile.

As Fading Angel points out, you need to cherish such moments. They mostly come in the beginning of the disease, and it's all downhill from there.

Ms. Donahue has a powerful story to tell, in relating what she has learned in her voyage through helping her Mom through 14 years of the disease relying on at-home care. I hope that every relative and friend of Alzheimer's victims will read and learn from this book. It's a story about using the heart and the mind to create a better life for everyone.

Unlike most book's about Alzheimer's patients which focus on the disease, or "managing" the patients, this one empathizes with the afflicted as well as their care givers. People with Alzheimer's know that there's something wrong with them, and it makes them feel anxious. This book is filled with loving suggestions for dealing with that anxiety, as well as building a new relationship with the ill person.

Lead with love and compassion, and it seems to work better for everyone involved. I loved reading about Ms. Donahue's many ideas for activities for her Mom that helped her feel needed and participating.

I was even more impressed with the material in the book on how to prepare for the consequences of Alzheimer's. There are legal, financial, and care-giving decisions to be made. There are resources that need to be mustered. And you have to do all of this while being overwhelmed with the consequences disease itself. People start by forgetting names. Pretty soon, they have trouble remembering where they are or what they just did. This book opens with Ms. Donahue's Mom wanting to have pie and coffee, and forgetting that they had just finished doing so five minutes earlier.

Ms. Donahue also makes a powerful case for middle class families getting more financial help from the federal government for at-home care. Her solutions for finding help with care-giving are very inspired and inspiring!

The limitation of reading any single book about the experience with Alzheimer's is that the consequences of each person's affliction will differ. I suggest that you also read Ms. Jacqueline Marcell's book, Elder Rage, to see what it can be like to care for an aggressive Father who is suffering from the disease.

The strength of a case history like this one is that it opens up the details and the pain in a way that statistics can never capture. You will be helping someone whom you love, probably a parent or spouse, and they will just slip away from you. As Ms. Donahue points out, it's not just like taking care of a two-year old. Two-year olds can learn and remember.

The one thing that this book did not address is the recently published research (in Aging with Grace) on the brains of those who did and did not have Alzheimer's. Having a great deal of mental stimulation in your life will stave-off the onset of the symptoms. Those with more education, people who work with ideas, readers, and especially teachers can help themselves to some extent. Until more research is conducted, this may be the most we can do.

Perform all the parts of your life with grace, love, and compassion!