Forget-Me-Nots call on participants

 

 

Southern Hills Forget-Me-Nots is a newly formed team that will commemorate those with Alzheimer’s disease at the Walk to End Alzheimer’s in Rapid City Sept. 24. And yet, the Forget-Me-Nots are more than a fundraising group.

 

Not only is Southern Hills Forget-Me-Nots a real-time support for families currently experiencing a loved one’s dementia, the group is also a scaffold for grieving families affected by Alzheimer’s disease, and a group where volunteers are always welcome to offer time and care.

 

The Forget-Me-Nots were formed this year by Peg Nervig. While taking care of her aging parents for several years, Nervig worked to especially understand Alzheimer’s disease as it took her mother’s health.

 

Nervig, in turn, has taken stressful, life-changing experiences with disease and funneled them into creating the local resource of Southern Hills Forget-Me-Nots. Nervig’s goal is that the Forget-Me-Nots lead the way in helping families reduce dementia’s risks, determine quality care, understand financial healthcare strategies and more.  

 

The Forget-Me-Nots team is specifically looking for ten people to partner with them for this month’s Alzheimer’s walk, and they feel this is an attainable goal because so many people know a loved one affected by dementia. 2020 statistics reflect there are about 18,000 adults in South Dakota with Alzheimer’s disease.

 

Alzheimer’s disease greatly harms the brain leading to increasingly confused thinking, and people with advanced Alzheimer’s often need a lot of help taking care of themselves all day, every day.

 

In the early stages, most people with Alzheimer’s don’t know there’s anything wrong. Dr. Priscilla Bade, a board certified Rapid City family practice physician specializing in geriatric medicine, said attentive family and friends can sometimes be first to notice signs of the disease, and it’s common for the elder to not want to go to the doctor to discuss problems.

 

Nervig mentioned an especially difficult part about Alzheimer’s is the change in family responsibilities; those who previously took care of us can now be the ones needing to be taken care of.

 

Similarly, having to remind a parent/grandparent who you are is the type of excruciating experience that Southern Hills Forget-Me-Nots helps families through one-on-one.

 

There are Alzheimer’s support groups and resources online, but it’s also common for these websites to be full of frustration due to the invisibly changing nature of medical and health topics. The Forget-Me-Nots’ aim is to be a local, comprehensive aid to families caring for people in all stages of dementia.

 

The Forget-Me-Nots are a group that’s a calm reference to understand how to deal with a loved one’s frightening memory loss and the thousands of accompanying questions, decisions and worries their caregivers face.

 

Southern Hills Forget-Me-Nots is replete with suggestions for how to help those with Alzheimer’s. Nervig mentions those with dementia can benefit greatly from coloring books, viewing wildlife from a porch, listening to music, being read to, and most importantly, spending time with loved ones in person, via phone and mail.

 

The Walk to End Alzheimer’s takes the realistic sadness involved with the disease and exposes the layers of hope behind it. Scientists are actively working on a cure for Alzheimer’s disease and Dr. Bade notes there are medicines which help with its symptoms.

 

The Alzheimer’s Association walk will be held at Founder’s Park in Rapid City Sept. 24 and you may register today with the Forget-Me-Nots by emailing EndAlz@goldenwest.net or calling phone 520-488-3349.