The Long Road Called Goodbye - by Charlotte A Akin (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

Part clinical case study, part family journal, The Long Road Called Goodbye is a powerful and moving account of one family's thirteen-year struggle with Alzheimer's. This engaging informative book is a closely documented clinical study that reads like a novel, filled with all the feelings, crises, and conflicts experienced by patient and family. It is a story of love, loyalty, perseverance, strength, and dignity. The Long Road Called Goodbye makes a major contribution to the care of AD patients and their families. The book will be of interest to professionals who work with Alzheimer's patients, including physicians, staff at care-giving facilities, and state agencies, as well as to families who struggle with this disease.

Review Quotes

The book is indeed informative, insightful, tender, descriptive, revealing and at times happy and sad. They laughed, ried, learned, grew, fell apart, got themselves back together again and continued on the journey of the truly long goodbye.-----Charlotte Akin, Alzheimer Society of Washington

The Long Road Called Goodbye is not just another book about Alzheimer's disease. It is a story about individuals, professionals, families, and friends -- how the disease becomes a part of their lives and how they help each other. We are enriched by the day-to-day details of managing care and preserving the rights of the person. We are introduced to the philosophical and spiritual questions that challenge us to decide what is best so that we honor the person and his or her wishes. Thanks for sharing your journey, Charlotte. We knew that people suffered. But you show us how they laugh, they cry, they learn, they grow, they fall and get up again. The Long Road Called Goodbye: Tracing the Course of Alzheimer's is a story about finding and living the courage to love.-----Howard Gruetzner, M.Ed., author of Alzheimer's: A Cargiver's Guide and Source Book.

About the Author

Charlotte A. Akin holds a B.A. from the University of Washington in sociology and a Master's degree in Educational Leadership from the University of Portland. When her mother first received a tentative diagnosis of Alzheimer's, the author became the family researcher and began a case study. From then until the end of her mother's life, she charted the course of this disease.