Frank talk from friends pinpointed her symptoms

Agoura Hills

Franklin, a registered nurse and veteran healthcare administrator with a master's degree from UCLA, never wondered whether something was wrong until, in late 2005, a couple of friends from work took her out to lunch and told her they were worried about her.

In office conversations, they told her, she was repeating things, often asking the same question -- of the same person -- more than once. Franklin's husband hadn't noticed anything was amiss, and her co-workers' observations, she says, took her completely by surprise. But looking back now, she recalls that she was having increasing difficulty finding words.

"There are those who really don't get it, and they think they're just fine," Franklin says. "That happened to me. Denial is a very powerful tool, and we all have it."

Franklin's deteriorating mental condition was first diagnosed as mild cognitive impairment. But by last fall, at age 58, Franklin was diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer's disease -- one of the fewer than 4% of those diagnosed before age 65. Though many of those with early-onset Alzheimer's have a genetic variation recognized as a contributor, Franklin's type of Alzheimer's is not hereditary.

Although she began taking the medications Aricept and Namenda last year to boost cognitive function, Franklin says her problems with short-term memory -- as well as with finding words and keeping sequences of events straight -- have worsened. But she has found help and comfort through the Alzheimer's Assn.'s California Southland chapter, which provides specialized programs and support to those with early-onset Alzheimer's.

Although Franklin will occasionally repeat a fact about herself, in conversation this articulate woman monitors herself carefully and will sometimes stop and ask if she has already mentioned something. A lifelong habit of note-taking and list-making helps with her short-term memory problems, she says.

Her greatest challenge? "The word-finding makes me crazy," she says. She's also begun to experience a frustrating inability to spell some words -- a marked departure from a lifelong knack for spelling.

Through the Alzheimer's Assn., Franklin addresses groups on the importance of diagnosis and research. "I am very optimistic, if there won't be a cure, we'll have better medication. I really believe it," she says. She got that optimism from her mother, who used to tell her, "If everyone put their problems on a wash line to dry, they'd take a look around and take their own back. Because there's always someone worse off than you."

-- Melissa Healy