Aging Begins at 30

No You're Not Losing Your Mind

I had two encounters that jogged my memory about memory. My wife's former secretary asked advice about her Mother's encounter with Alzheimer's Disease. "We spent two days last week-end together at my home and then she told my sister, 'I never see her. It's been months since we talked'. We recounted our experience with Swiss relatives who established a sign-in book so they could say, 'See grandma we were here 3 days ago.'"

Our hospital has monthly coffee break talks. This week it was on Memory and Aging by Dr. Julie Suhr. A lot of people showed and must worry about their memory. "Challenge yourself mentally," she said. Billions of nerve cells form the brain and generate electric currents but at the cell to cell interface the message is transmitted chemically. She explained how new information memory compared with old well-learned memory. How factual memory compared to skilled memory, like typing. Visual memory (such as recognizing faces) compared to verbal memory. All these are headquartered at the inside part of the temporal lobe of the brain behind the skull's bony archway joining your ear to your eye. Many scattered parts of the brain, however, are used in remembering. A very important coordinator is the sea horse (hippocampus) shaped area.

Visual memory involves the right side of the brain and verbal the left side. Do you have husband's (or wife's) disease? "Yes dear, I hear you" but you can't recall it later? Lack of concentration leads to poor remembering.

About half of the older people with serious memory problems have Alzheimer's and they are not aware of their loss. There are other losses too in Alzheimer's Disease. The new CAT scanner called the PET scan which shows where energy molecules are used normally shows plenty of activity. In Alzheimer's Disease, (not "old-timers") there is truly a loss of function and the PET scan shows loss of the orange and red areas of high energy use. The other half of the population with memory loss can be due to one of a dozen or more diseases such as multiple strokes or thyroid problems that will benefit from diagnosis and treatment. To see if you need expert medical help with your forgetful relative, have them draw a clock with numbers 1 to 12 on the dial and then have them put the hands at 4:30. If they can't do it, get help.

No you are not losing your mind. When you age normally, you lose 20% of your coordinating temporal brain area. You still have enough to do as good a job as before but it takes longer. You need to challenge yourself mentally, be involved socially, avoid stress and read, write and calculate. You can help your memory with good physical health and a recording diary or memory book plus an easily portable pocket diary. You can also play with people's names so that you can associate them with a familiar object.

Divide your shopping list into chunks of information such as meats, vegetables or things at the clothing store. If you have to remember a series of related facts some people assign each fact to a room in their home and then later take a mental walk through their house to pick up the facts when recall is needed. Always have a pen and paper handy. Remember the thinnest ink is better than the strongest memory.

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See related Patient Topics Brain and Nervous System, Memory, Mental Health and Behavior or Seniors' Health.

See related Provider Topics Brain and Nervous System, Memory, Mental Health and Behavior or Seniors' Health.

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