If I press myself with great concentration to try to keep up (in a conversation), I feel as though something short circuits in my brain. At this point, I become disoriented, have difficulty with my balance if I am standing, my speech becomes slow, or I cannot find the right words to express myself.
My Journey into Alzheimer’s Disease, Robert Davis, p. 85-86
It is exhausting to communicate with some degree of articulation (or just to communicate some days), be it a serious conversation or a social chat.
A View From Within, Thanddeus Raushi, p 25
It takes a great deal of work to do what in the past seemed to come “naturally”, with ease. I would sometimes fault myself for not just relaxing, for not simply enjoying it. Maybe the words would just flow like they always had. But when I do lay back, my concentration on what is happening seems to fall apart. So I always need to work at the conversation.
A View From Within, Thaddeus Raushi, p 25
But I also become “wrung out”. This is not a figment of imagination. I personally know. Sometimes I just have to step back, get my mind off of everything, and relax for a few moments after a conversation. I often find myself taking a deep breath such as the kind that follows an emotional or tear-filled event. There is a period of recovery.
A View From Within, Thaddeus Raushi, p 26
In my present condition (just seven month since diagnosis) there are times when I feel normal. At other times I cannot follow what is going on around me; as the conversation whips too fast from person to person and before I have processed one comment, the thread had moved to another person or another topic, and I am left isolated from the action – alone in a crowd.
My Journey into Alzheimer’s Disease, Robert Davis, p. 85
Without the aid of the visual cues of the person she talked to, conversations on the phone often baffled her. Words sometimes ran together abrupt changes in topic were difficult for her to anticipate and follow, and her comprehension suffered.
Still Alice, Lisa Genova, p. 94
As her ability to track what was said in complex conversations with many participants declined, Alice's sensitivity to what wasn't said, to body language and unspoken feelings, had heightened.
Still Alice, Lisa Genova, p. 170
The words, the information, the meaning in the woman's questions and in Alice's own answers were like soap bubbles, the kind children blew out of those little plastic wands, on a windy day. They drifted away from her quickly and in dizzying directions, requiring enormous strain and concentration to track. And even if she managed to actually hold a number of them in her sight for some promising duration, it was invariably too soon that pop! they were gone, burst without obvious cause into oblivion, as if they'd never existed.
Still Alice, Lisa Genova, p. 242
“It’s getting harder to talk,” he said to me one day. “I feel as if I have to drop out of conversation because I can’t remember where it started. I can’t catch it, as though everything is vague and very far away.”
Ten Thousand Joys & Ten Thousand Sorrows, Olivia Ames Hoblitzelle, p.170
"The words get stuck,” he declared. “I’ve got this galloping brain drain. I know what I want to say, but the word horde is locked up. It’s like a corral filled with horses, all pushing against each other to get out, but they can’t find the gate."
Ten Thousand Joys & Ten Thousand Sorrows, Olivia Ames Hoblitzelle, p.195