Does losing words eventually become not talking at all?

Have you requested a brain scan? My husband is 75 and was diagnosed at 70 with PPA - Primary Progressive Aphasia caused by FTD. He had scans to prove it. He’s now in Skilled Nursing 8 weeks and rapidly going down. Has been for 3 years. My life has changed both good and bad. Bad = loneliness and I miss him so much. Good = no more full time caregiving. It’s so sad. He’s nonverbal now and just squeezes my hand. Can’t talk. It’s the worst disease to happen to a human being. The frontal lobes shrink away - it’s nothing like Alzheimer’s or vascular dementia. It can turn into ALS which would be devastating.
I just pray he goes peacefully soon because he’s aware of his brain dying - he cries a lot and the aides and nurses comfort him and there’s sedatives prescribed, too. He tries to speak so bad, but, it’s just sounds. Bruce Willis has the same thing diagnosed months apart. I hope you get to a neurologist and find out. There’s no cure, but knowing is better than guessing.

She has joined the club. I am almost 84, and I know I am losing memory every day. I'm not denying it ,I know it's here. Most elders will not accept they have lost memory. Just go with the flow, tell her where to put things, what to do, etc., watch closely, redo or have her redo. My husband suffered with memory loss, getting worse every day. It was sad to see this highly intelligent man become a little 8 year old. He knew I was someone special, like, a nice person to take care of him, as he didn't know where his wife was. I never left !!!!

Is It possible that she has had a stroke?

When my dad had a stroke he would mix up words. Once he told me that we needed to pick up a gallon of paint for my mom.

I asked my father what was mom painting. When he didn’t answer, I called my mom and she said that she told my father to bring home a gallon of milk for her.

My step-mother had FTD, she was losing her ability to speak, you could not hold any type of conversation with her, the last 2 years were very difficult communication wise.

My Husband was not real talkative for as long as I knew him. (almost 50 years)
As he began his (our) journey with dementia (diagnosed with Alzheimer's but I think he also had Vascular dementia as well) he talked less and less. I think it could have been that he lost words or he was afraid of making a mistake. But the last about 8 years of his life he was non verbal. He made noises. Almost like a hum or moaning noise. He did laugh on occasion.
When I took him to Adult Day there were residents that did not talk at all, there were some that were verbal.
I think it has more to do with what portion of the brain is most effected by the damage that is done by the dementia.
And I think there is a good possibility that many people with dementia do have mini strokes that are never diagnosed simply because the effects of the mini stroke go unnoticed because of the dementia. If a person without dementia had a mini stroke you might notice a difference in speech or gait but with dementia you may not notice that because the speech and gait are already compromised.

I, as far as I know, do not have dementia. I can describe things but cannot name them. I had a stroke but the doctors say a lot of it is just old age. I tell my grandchildren my hard drive is full of useless information and the little blue troll in my head has a hard time finding stuff because there is too much up there. For example, I can remember how you can tell if a hen can lay eggs easily, but I can't remember what I had for breakfast. Please don't scold your mother or say things like "Remember, I told you so" If yelling at her would help her remember, I would say go for it, but it won't

MSalazar227: Yes, her brain cannot find the correct word.

Aphasia = loss of ability to understand or express speech, caused by brain damage.

5 years into Lewy Body my mom still talks but most of it sounds pretty nonsensical. She uses wrong words and jumps subjects in mid-sentence. There are rare days where she speaks better and days of little speech…this is horrible. She also tells me everything is “broken” which actually means she can not figure out how to use an object. A clock is a phone. I sometimes just go right along with her and pretend I understand. She smiles and appears content. Good Luck!

Yea this happens they can’t find the right words - some days are better then others . My Grandmother stopped talking with Parkinson’s and passed at 57 .

My husband has FTD. I have not heard him speak in 4+ months. Before that it was a word or two every couple of months, usually when he was upset. About a month ago, he fell and cut his head. When the doctor was numbing his head and when he was putting in the staples I could tell my husband was in extreme pain. I was sure he would say something, but he did not. 😢

My mom is in the last stages of dementia. She may start a sentence or thought but can’t finish it. She mostly doesn’t talk or communicate at all. I hate this disease.

Yes, what you are seeing is not untypical and dependent on what part of the brain is effected certain things take more a hit than others in certain individuals.

After a clear diagnosis and full workup by neuro-psych MD I would look up the type of dementia the doctors most believe your mother is suffering from, and what can be done by her state of anxiety.

Some people do become almost completely non-verbal so you are correct. In fact, as an RN I can tell you that many people go back to being curled silently into a fetal position if they live long enough. It is quite sad really to see that full circle.

Be certain to keep a good eye on that urine infection; do dip stick test frequently. They can have a very bad effect on people with dementia.

Online is absolutely full of information for you. In fact you could read all day long and for months and never get all you need to know, so continue to keep reading. Look up "non verbal senior and dementia." You will get a wealth of info.

Marengo is very familiar to me; I spent my girlhood winters on a farm in Woodstock, Il. !

MSalazar227, the way I look at it, our brain is like a lot of filing cabinets. As we get older, it just takes more time to find the right file (words) in that filing cabinet. Some files could be misplaced. Some files we hadn't seen for years so those words aren't familiar, etc.


Hubby and I are the same age (78) and it seems like we are aging on the same time frame. We just laugh about forgetting names of actors, or famous people. Mainly because we hadn't need to think about those people in quite some time. No big deal.


We park ourselves in front of game shows where we can think along with the contestants and we still do pretty good. Any old games shows your Mom liked? "Classic Concentration", "Classic Password", or even fun shows like "Match Game" which is easy to play along.

My mom calls everything juice. Whether it's actual apple juice, Ensure protein drinks or water. Before that, she would call everything soda, and she hasn't had soda in a few years.

My mom struggles with names of things as well. I've learned to figure out what she's talking about most of the time.

MS, you need to learn all you can about dementia, everything you can. It will help for you to understand your mom and aging and help you with patience. Not that your not being patient, but it really makes it easier when you learn as much as you can.

YouTube Teepa Snow. She is amazing. There are a lot of really good books out there.

And it's all really great stuff to know because there will be more elderly in all of are lives. So it's good to learn anyways

It will help you so much moving forward.

Best of luck , we understand how difficult this horrible deasses is.

It's aphasia. May have been caused by TIAs.

https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/aphasia/symptoms-causes/syc-20369518

"Treatment

If the brain damage is mild, it's possible to recover language skills without treatment. However, most people undergo speech and language therapy to rehabilitate their language skills and supplement their communication experiences. Researchers are investigating the use of medications, alone or in combination with speech therapy, to help people with aphasia.

Speech and language rehabilitation

Recovery of language skills is usually a slow process. Although most people make significant progress, few people regain full pre-injury communication levels.
Speech and language therapy aims to improve the ability to communicate. The therapy helps by restoring as much language as possible, teaching how to make up for lost language skills and finding other methods of communicating.

Therapy:

Starts early. Some studies have found that therapy is most effective when it begins soon after the brain injury.

Often works in groups. In a group setting, people with aphasia can try out their communication skills in a safe environment. Participants can practice starting conversations, speaking in turn, clearing up confusion and fixing conversations that have completely broken down.

May include use of computers. Using computer-assisted therapy can be especially helpful for relearning verbs and word sounds (phonemes).

Medications

Certain drugs are being studied for the treatment of aphasia. These include drugs that may improve blood flow to the brain, enhance the brain's recovery ability or help replace depleted chemicals in the brain (neurotransmitters). Several medications, such as memantine (Namenda), donepezil (Aricept, Adlarity), galantamine (Razadyne ER) and piracetam, have shown promise in small studies. But more research is needed before these treatments can be recommended.

Other treatments

Brain stimulation is being studied for aphasia treatment and may help improve the ability to name things. But no long-term research has been done yet. One treatment is called transcranial magnetic stimulation and another is transcranial direct current stimulation.

These treatments aim to stimulate damaged brain cells. Both are noninvasive. One uses magnetic fields and the other uses a low current through electrodes placed on the head."

Parts of her brain are dying so the ability to pull the words out dies with it. It’s terrible.