One summer while I was a caregiver for a woman with severe Alzheimer's disease, she started telling me that her back hurt almost every day during our walks. Only, she couldn't describe what sort of pain it was.  I told her physician what had happened but he said that he tapped her back and she didn't feel pain to any of it. I wasn't entirely convinced that her mattress was poor enough to cause the problem but the only other place she spent a lot of time on was the dining room chair. I bought a new chair for her and shortly after that day, her back problems went away.

Victims of Alzheimer's disease cannot say when they are hurt. The best caregivers are aware that pain is present and do what it takes to heal.

Keet and I always have a great time with Lo in NYC. Lo is an 80-year-old woman with late-stages Alzheimer's disease although you wouldn't know it unless you tried carrying a conversation with her for over a minute. In very short spurts, she appears sharp with her engaging smile and strong eye contact. Keet is Lo's new caregiver and together they make an awesome and comical team.

During my last visit to NYC, Keet tried to get Lo to take a photograph of us with her iPhone. Keet explained how to hold the phone and press the camera icon to take a photograph. Of course, Lo didn't remember any of the instructions. She pressed all sorts of places on the screen and then said as she stared at the display, "Okay... someone is wearing a blue shirt..." Keet and I suddenly looked at each other and cracked up giggling. Lo was wearing a blue shirt and had accidentally pressed the flip mode on the camera and didn't realize that she was staring at herself. Still, she proceeded to make sense of what she was staring at by finding the next thing close to the color blue before her.

"There," she pointed to my purple duffel bag. We laughed louder. Lo began to laugh, too, although she admitted, "I have no idea why you two are laughing." We teased her as we explained why we were laughing and she laughed again with us.  The good caregiver with a sense of humor can do a lot to help the client laugh and feel happy throughout the day. Clients with dementia become more easy to amuse as the disease progresses so it's fair to take advantage of the situation by making them easily laugh, the way we all did as children to simple jokes, funny gestures, and sometimes, just by watching others have a good time.