Tucked away on a steep street in this rough-hewn mountain town, an old woman found herself diapering her middle-age children.A fourth lives in Medellín and is cared for there. He married a distant cousin whose also has three siblings with Alzheimer's. The outlook is bleak for their children, who have genes from both sides.
At frighteningly young ages, in their 40s, four of Laura Cuartas’s children began forgetting and falling apart, assaulted by what people here have long called La Bobera, the foolishness. It is a condition attributed, in hushed rumors, to everything from touching a mysterious tree to the revenge of a wronged priest.
It is Alzheimer’s disease, and at 82, Mrs. Cuartas, her gray raisin of a face grave, takes care of three of her afflicted children.
The one bright thing about this isolated Andean pocket of a population where early-onset Alzheimer's is so rampant is that scientists can study them and perhaps find drugs or vaccines that could save those not yet in the throes of the disorder, not only there, but around the world.
I have to admit, Alzheimer's is something I dread. My great-grandmother lived with it for at least fifteen years, going from a vibrant, sassy woman to a shell of a person, rarely communicating or interacting with those around her. My own memory is abysmal, who used to never have to take notes in high school because I just remembered it all. I live in the South, which seems to have higher rates than average. It's a real fear of mine.
For more information on Alzheimer's, there is an excellent booklet by the Alzheimer's Association called 2010 Alzheimer's Facts and Figures (a PDF), plus the association itself is a great resource.
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