welcome to the organic green doctor blog

i am a family physician who was diagnosed with
early mild cognitive impairment(mci) amnestic type on december 21, 2010
this is a precursor to alzheimers disease
because of this diagnosis i have opted to stop practicing medicine
this blog will be about my journey with this disease
please feel free to follow me along this path
i will continue blogging on organic gardening, green living,
solar power, rainwater collection, and healthy living
i will blog on these plus other things noted to be interesting

Wednesday, February 2, 2022

my story revisited #122-my aricept dreams keep a coming

MY STORY REVISITED #122-MY ARICEPT DREAMS KEEP A COMING

each morning i sit in my living room with the computer writing my blog
when my wife she wakes up she texts me that she wants her tea
so
i make her tea 
then i take it to her and visit with her for a few minutes

i usually revisit my dream from the night before
if im lucky its still vivid in my brain
sometimes like now i  cant remember my dreams

i have aricept dreams
they started to be more vivid when i started aricpet or donepezil 11 years ago

the most common dream i have involve me being a doctor
commonly its in an emergency room or a clinic 
i usually am busy and cant keep up or i get lost or im at a new clinic
sometimes its with doctors ive worked with in the past or some of my old medical school classmates or sometimes its doctors i dont know who they are

the dreams are rarely violent or disturbing
frustrating sometimes

occasionally if i fall asleep watching the tv i will incorporate whatever is happening on the tv into my dream

i think my wife she enjoys my dream stories each morning


i will have a mri of the brain in two days at ucla to rule out a microbleed
im asymptomatic at this time
my last one in january was normal

my next infusion will be on march 1st
i will be on my regular every 28 day adhuhelm or aducanumab infusion schedule after that
__________
01-24-2014

I HAD A DREAM

these are famous words
mlk spoke them years ago
we celebrated his holiday earlier this month
  
im using these words today since i had a dream this week
it wasnt one of vast importance that dr king had
but for me it made me think and wonder a lot

as many of you know who have read this blog some
i have mild cognitive impairment amnestic type that is
thought to probably be due to alzheimers disease
if my dream is true i may have it

i take aricept (donepezil) for this hoping to slow down the
symptoms for a period of time
i dont know if it works but things havent gotten worse in
3 years
it the donepezil makes me have these real vivid dreams

ive been thinking a lot about whether i have the disease or not
as i notice some memory issues that i wonder if its due to
my age since my hair is now full grey or if its the disease
sneaking its head more into my life

however my neurologist thinks i might
my long term disability insurance agrees since they are paying
me my physician salary every year
now the federal government agrees with them
so i must have a problem right
and
of course i feel like thats what i have

the other night now this is in my dream
i was in college in my last year at the university where i
graduated from in california

during the dream i kept getting lost trying to find my classes
to take my final exams
some i even showed up late for
some professors allowed me to go ahead and take the exams

as i was testing i had difficulty taking the exams because i
couldnt remember the material
because i had just been diagnosed with possible alzheimers
and was seeing the effect on my memory
showing up as failing to remember the material i heard
in class studied and tested for

i finished the exams
but i felt like i didnt do well on them
but i never got the scores
so i dont really know how i did
i woke up and when i tried to go back to sleep
i couldnt get back into my dream

it felt strange to be a college student who couldnt remember the
material i had tried to retain
it felt very surreal

so i had a dream the other night
unlike dr king i hope mine
doesnt come true
__________
at the time i wrote this my memory had improved some but i had not had all my testing done to definitely diagnose me
now i have
i have the apoe 4 apoe4 gene the late onset alzheimers gene
i have a positive spinal fluid for abnormal levels of amyloid and tau
i have a positive  amyloid pet scan for amyloid
this solidifies my diagnosis

in the research study im in now they do blood tests for biomarkers 
however i dont get to get those results
these blood biomarker tests will soon be available in the private world for doctors to do on their patients who want to know if they have it or not

we have come a long way in the last 11 years in the alzheimers world

the organicgreen doctor

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