“When someone has dementia, their true personality comes out. We all experience emotions like anger, rage, and frustration, but healthy adults are often skilled at using willpower to avoid childish emotional outbursts.
For someone with dementia, they are no longer able to control their behavior. It’s possible that they were an angry person before, but they hid it better before they had dementia.
I wonder if someone who is extraordinarily kind, loving, and calm would remain kind and calm even if she were diagnosed with dementia. Perhaps, instead of having aggressive outbursts, she would do bizarre things that were still kind, like trying to give all of her possessions away.”
When I heard this recently on a podcast, my jaw about hit the floor.
I’m not going to name any names because the point of this blog post is not to disparage that podcast. It’s actually an amazing podcast and most of the content is fantastic.
This episode, however, REALLY missed the mark.
It’s clear that these podcasters have never watched a loved one slowly disappear from dementia.
My step dad came into my life when I was a little kid. He was a kind, caring man, and everyone loved him. I couldn’t have asked for a better dad to me or a better husband to my mom.
I’m not saying he was perfect. Of course, he got angry sometimes. Everyone does.
I’m sure even Mother Theresa got annoyed from time to time and had unkind thoughts occasionally.
My step dad was diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer’s when he was only 60 years old. He’s 66 now and in the late stages of the disease.
He no longer the resembles the person I knew (pre-Alzheimer’s) very much at all.
He’s often agitated, aggressive, and violent. He told a police officer once that he punched my mom because “it was fun”.
When he isn’t angry (which he is most of the time), he’s stoic, unemotional, and has a blank expression on his face (which is common with dementia patients).
When I tell him I love him, he doesn’t respond at all, or he gives me an odd response like “thank you” or “I know”.
While I can understand why someone might think that dementia brings out “true” personality, and it’s theoretically possible that this could happen occasionally (particularly in the early stages), I think it’s not the case for A LOT of people with dementia (especially those in the late stages)…
and this idea is causing A LOT of unnecessary pain for people who have a loved one with dementia.
I don’t want to believe that my step dad doesn’t tell me he loves me anymore because he never actually did or that he’s always secretly wanted to be abusive and cruel to my mom.
Frankly, that is completely absurd.
Dementia affects A LOT more than just someone’s ability to use willpower to regulate their behavior.
Dementia destroys numerous areas of the brain, including the areas that control emotions, rational thought processes, sensory perceptions, and communication.
My step dad is confused all the time, and he has a lot of bizarre delusions and hallucinations. Of course, he acts aggressive when he’s so confused about literally everything.
Imagine how frustrating and scary that would be.
He’s not acting angry and aggressive because he’s always secretly been a jerk and he was just really good at hiding it for the past 30 years.
He’s acting aggressive because he’s terrified, miserable, and so incredibly confused. He gets angry at my mom and constantly repeats “I know what you did” to her because his disease is feeding him strange delusions that aren’t true.
Those of us who have never experienced dementia cannot even come close to understanding what a nightmare it would be for the person living it.
When my step dad hurls cruel insults at people, I don’t believe that it’s because he’s been having these thoughts for 30 years, and dementia removed his filter.
Dementia is destroying his brain and causing him to think all kinds of bizarre, nonsensical, and cruel thoughts.
Sometimes those thoughts come out of his mouth. Other times, he can’t express himself verbally, so he lashes out by throwing things or hitting people.
As a side note, it’s interesting that men with dementia are much more likely than women to become aggressive or apathetic.
This is because specific patterns of brain degeneration are much more common in men.
This is just one of the many facts indicating that aggression and apathy are not signs of underlying personality traits, but rather, these things are signs of damage to the brain.
While some of the person’s original personality may still be in there somewhere, I truly believe that most (if not all) of the changes that we see are the result of the disease that is completely destroying his brain.
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