A Life Well Stolen: A True Story of Alzheimer's & Betrayal

Work hard your whole life. Make sacrifices. Save your money. Build your estate. Plan your retirement. Make a will.

Then get Alzheimer's and lose it all.

Like my dad, who developed the disease and was taken advantage of as a result of his vulnerability. As if it wasn’t enough that he lost all of his memories and his ability to function effectively, in his weakness someone he trusted took advantage of him, robbing him of everything he owned.

And it was really very easily done, and so confoundedly legal.

The lawyers told us there was nothing that could be done, but we couldn’t accept that. We were his family and we had to fight for him. Our struggle for justice lasted five years and cost us hundreds of thousands of dollars in legal fees and incalculable emotional distress. Worse, while all this legal battling was going on, as days turned into months and months turned into years, we slowly lost the man we were fighting for, as Alzheimer’s stole away his mind and eventually his body.

Through it all we came to understand a great deal about the disease of Alzheimer’s, but we also discovered many things about ourselves and others. We observed that some people were not who they claimed to be, and others not all they should be. We learned that a man of God was not as saintly as he professed. Most of us realized how strong our family’s ties held, while one of us chose to break those bonds and give in to bitterness. But the most important lesson we learned was how others who suffer from Alzheimer’s or any form of dementia can avoid a similar fate and protect their estates for themselves and their loved ones.