The Gift of Alzheimer's

By Lisa Novak

Musician and hairstylist Lisa Novak shares the story of her mother's journey with Alzheimer's disease and some of the personal, family strugglesas well as the gifts that come with it. Its a spiritual story filled with real love, heartache, and hope.

• Language: English
• Publisher: LifeRich Publishing
• Release date: Oct 6, 2015
• ISBN: 9781489705396

Lisa Novak

After learning about my mother’s Alzheimer’s and watching her battle it for years, I decided to write a short story about my journey with her. Every time I looked for books to read about Alzheimer’s, they provided helpful medical advice, but nothing personal. I hope telling my story will help inform and encourage others going through this disease, either themselves or with their loved ones. I live in Houston, Texas, and often travel to Tucson, Arizona, where my husband is from. I am a hair salon owner and stylist, and I write and perform music with my husband throughout the United States and Europe. We wrote a song honoring my mother and have included a link to it in this book.

Book preview

Copyright © 2015 Lisa Novak.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

LifeRich Publishing is a registered trademark of The Reader’s Digest Association, Inc.

LifeRich Publishing

1663 Liberty Drive

Bloomington, IN 47403

www.liferichpublishing.com

1 [phone]

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

ISBN: 978-1-4897-0538-9 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4897-0539-6 (e)

LifeRich Publishing rev. date: 10/6/2015

13970.png

CONTENTS

Acknowledgements

Foreword

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Afterword

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

My heartfelt thanks to all of the folks who helped me learn about Alzheimer’s and who gave their time, love and care to my mother or family during these difficult years. I am forever grateful for your concern and compassion.

Thank you to my clients who have listened to my stories through the years and were understanding during my crazy hours of being away from the salon.

Thank you to my siblings who each loved our mother in their own special way.

Thank you to Joan and Ann for our longsanity walks and talks, and understanding of large family dynamics.

Thank you to Joan Wagner for your proofreading and editing skills, Mike Dupont for sharing your writing experience, encouragement and for asking the questions to help me dig a bit deeper, and Paul T. Mueller for our serendipitous meeting that resulted in your helping me put my thoughts together in a cohesive form.

With deep gratitude I thank Sally and Wendy for your steadfast wisdom, guidance, support and experience, strength and hope.

Thank you to my husband, Rich Hopkins, who believed in this book and encouraged me from the start. You have been a tremendous support through some very trying years in our life. Thank you for being by my side through it all.

Most of all thanks goes to my God, who has brought me through this difficult time and provided me with insights, comfort and peace.

FOREWORD

In a perfect world we would all have our essential papers in order. Legal papers that state our wishes concerning our care, our wills, power of attorney or appointed guardianships in the event that we become unable to care for ourselves or make our own decisions due to accidents or aging. I have listened to many stories of families torn apart by such situations as they struggle to agree upon making these decisions for a parent or spouse that did not make their wishes known in writing ahead of time.

If you are reading this book, my guess is that you know or have known someone dealing with the disease of Alzheimer’s. My prayer is that all involved in these situations can work together to support each other rather than adding to the already enourmous weight of caring for the Alzheimer’s patient.

I began writing my story in 2010 after my mother was diagnosed with early to mid stage Alzheimer’s. I was touring in Germany with my boyfriend’s band and found myself with free hours everyday to reflect and write as we traveled to the next city to perform. Even being so far away, my thoughts