Wednesday, January 14, 2004

The Trip

Yes, I'm back and the trip was much harder than I had anticipated. But, for all the wrong things I was worried about! The level of concentration I had to keep for such a long time was probably the hardest and most wearing on me. You don't realize how hard it is to think! I guess that is one of those things we take for granted until it becomes a a right handed person breaking their right hand and all of a sudden realizing how difficult life can be!

I know the city pretty well, so I wasn't worried about getting around. I prefer to walk in New York instead of taking cabs. I was very frustrated when I found that even though the streets are numbered I had a hard time getting around. One day I had four appointments. I was staying at 6th and 53rd. My first meeting of the morning was at 6th and 45th Street. My second appointment of the day was 7th and 46th Street. Pretty easy to get from one place to the next, right? Well, not for me. I was totally confused and found myself having to walk back to the hotel at 6th and 53rd and starting all over to get to 7th and 46th. That was pretty frustrating. I felt really stupid.....I knew what I had to do to get there but I couldn't do it -- so I started all over! I did the same thing for the next two appointments of the day -- went back to the hotel in between each one because I couldn't get from point A to point B. But, I got around to where I needed to go and on I shouldn't be complaining. I figured out how to do it.......eventually. Dealing with Alzheimer's is just dealing with your life a different way. When you can't do something you figure out how to do it differently. That's hard to do and I don't know how long I'll be able to do that -- think of the alternative way to do things-- but hopefully it will be awhile before that happens.

The noise was pretty overwhelming in New York, but I knew that was going to be a problem. Everything is noisy in New York.........cabs honking, sirens wailing, people talking loud. I was prepared for that though. I just wasn't prepared for some of the other things that happened and, I'm too tired to go into those things!

I'm exhausted from the trip. It took a lot more out of me than it should have. I've been back for two days and I'm still exhausted. Tackling emails, mail, meetings and phone calls when I got back was awful. It is hard for me to compartmentalize things so when I got back to work and saw the mass of paper that had accumulated on my desk while I was gone I was overwhelmed. I still haven't been able to put it into piles of what to do or what to throw away. It's too much. I haven't figured out an alternative way to do that yet.......but I'm trying.

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