Page 571 - Demo

Aging Gracefully565%u2022%u2022%u2022%u2022%u2022When I mentioned to Lynn that we were nearing the third anniversary of her sustaining a concussion after cracking her head on the dock at our pond and almost drowning, she gave me a funny look. Then she said, %u201cIf you%u2019d had asked me, I%u2019d have said it was a year ago. I don%u2019t believe I%u2019ve accumulated three years worth of memories in that time.%u201d Some people can%u2019t remember the actual event that caused their concussion, but Lynn could remember hers quite clearly. Yet there was plenty about her memory that was still negatively affected. For the first year after the accident, her thinking had often been fuzzy or confused, but that evolved into just being a tad cloudy. Now, just recently, her mental processing was much more clear and crisp %u2014 which was a very good development. Also, up until very recently, she could sense that something was still wrong inside her head, but now that feeling was also gone %u2014 another good development. Yet, she continued to have problems with both short-term and long-term memory. When we were watching a television episode of American Pickers, in which a man described his post-concussion memory as like having some files deleted, Lynn said that described her long-term memory very well. There seemed to be quite a number of experiences in her past for which she had no recall whatsoever. We realized this whenever I would mention something we%u2019d done together, and she couldn%u2019t remember the event. At the same time, there were plenty of other long-term memories that remained intact.Lynn%u2019s short-term memory had also been affected. Over the months, we had assumed it would get better, and it had improved, but there were still problems. For example, she would sometimes forget where she had recently put something. Or she might ask me the same question two or three times over a week. If we were watching a TV mini-series over a few days, she%u2019d occasionally lose track of the plot. It was particularly frustrating for her to not remember the layout of the grocery store. Before her near-drowning, she had had a phenomenal (almost photographic) memory.