“You Don’t Look Like You Have Dementia,” By Wally Klatch

By Wally Klatch

I’m learning about dementia from the inside, by feeling it and by watching what it’s doing to me. I have a dark-humor line that describes the surrealistic nature of this condition: dementia is enough to make you crazy. Darker humor is on the way: dementia is a no-brainer.

Moving Toward The Surrealistic World of Dementia

More surrealism? My best weapon against dementia is dementia – and having a mission, which for me is raising Awareness and Conversation about dementia. It’s an important tool in fighting dementia. I’ve been keeping track of the flow of this dementia-as-foe/dementia-as-friend conflict at my website, TheAlzheimersConversation.com. It doesn’t matter what the mission is, but it’s important to have one. For example, there’s the fellow whose mission is to go to the animal shelter each day and sing to the animals.

The “Golden Moment” of Early-Stage Dementia

And even more surrealism: I call my Early-Stage Dementia my “Golden Moment,” as shown at another website of mine, MCIandMEE.com. How can that possibly be? I’m feeling and watching my brain deteriorate, as it can’t work as much or as fast as it used to. That’s terrible and will get more terrible. But connected with that, I’m feeling and watching something else happen to me: As my brain/thinking are less active, it’s leaving more space for my guts/feelings to play a role in my life. I was a Management Consultant for many years, whose life was lines and boxes. With dementia, I feel I have a much better balance of that (thinking) with emotion and connection (feeling). I’m liking this me better than the me I was before! Astonishingly, my feelings-memory and feelings-connections are stronger even while my brain-memory and brain-connections are declining. For example, someone told me about a meeting we had been to, but I couldn’t remember it at all. Then they said there was a tree outside that I really seemed to like, and then I remembered it immediately. I describe this availability of feelings as “I feel what I feel and I say what I feel.” I trust my feelings very much, and what they say comes straight out of my mouth, no brain involved. My brain actually gets in the way of my ability to speak. I’m more expressive now of what I feel than the way I was before, and I really like it. What’s invisible (and actually hidden) is the impact that dementia is having on my brain.  

Relating to a Person With Developing Dementia

My dementia has become more visible to other people as it develops. I often put up a hand to someone who is speaking to me to stop for a moment, because I’m having a hard time absorbing what they are saying. Expressing information such as descriptions or events is very difficult because remembering what I want to say, figuring out words that can say it, trying to take into account who the listener is, realizing that I don’t remember the listener’s name, face, or how I know them — these and other brain limitations severely impact my thinking-connection with the world.

So my “Golden Moment” is the condition I’m in now, with my gut/feeling side much stronger than it was before, but I have not yet reached the drooling/unintelligible stage that I’m moving toward. That is why I call it my Golden Moment, because I’m getting benefits from dementia that I hadn’t imagined I would have, but the horrible external symptoms of dementia are not yet appearing. I’m feeling my dementia very much, but to someone outside, I appear very expressive and very healthy, with none of the signs they associate with dementia. The result is the comment I often hear, “You don’t look like you have dementia.” I understand that the person is trying to be encouraging, but to me, they are denying my condition, which is the opposite of what I need.  

The person who asks “Do you remember?” such and such is trying to understand my capabilities, but I feel they are rubbing salt in my wounds. Please just assume I don’t remember and briefly describe what you are referring to. When you describe at length the dementia of someone you know or heard about, please stop at some point and ask about my experience with dementia. It’s different for each person, and I’ll feel seen and recognized if I can tell you something about my dementia as well.

Is This the Beginning of My Apocalypse?

I’m wondering whether the very significant presence of feelings and emotions is already giving signs that are common in more advanced stages of dementia. I say what I feel, which I’ve taken to be mostly very positive, but  when there is a negative feeling, such as someone I don’t like, those feelings come out as well (if I’m not successful at keeping my mouth shut). The other side of open expressive flow is that dementia is lowering barriers like social norms or personal constraints that would stop me from expressing less pleasant feelings. Those brakes don’t work as well as they used to. Whether this is good or bad, whether this is the behavior that later develops into anti-social and even violent responses to situations, I can’t say. I absolutely will say that I am very much feeling my dementia and watching what it is doing to me, and preparing to take the appropriate steps at the appropriate time.

Invitation to Visit My Surrealistic World

Yes, dementia certainly is a real-life form of surrealism. I’m losing touch with the world I once lived in. I invite you to be aware of this and to try to relate to me in my world, and to understand how difficult it has become for me to come back into yours.

Wally Klatch, 71, was diagnosed with Early-Stage Dementia in October 2022. He received his undergraduate degree from Indiana University and his Master’s Degree in Management from Purdue University. He worked as a Management Consultant to large and mid-sized companies in the areas of Organization and Operations, and spent thirty years living in Israel. Since being diagnosed, his condition has been connected by several neurologists to different brain conditions, including Parkinson’s Disease and brain spikes, among others. While his thought functionality is declining, his emotional awareness has increased, and he maintains functionality even while his relationship to himself and to his world is shifting.