After ignoring the mild symptoms of memory loss he had in his 30s, an Australian man is urging others to be aware of the warning signals of young onset Alzheimer’s.
Most of us imagine Alzheimer’s to be a remote illness that affects our grandparents rather than a person in their prime. But that misconception was debunked in mid-2024 when Fraser, a 41-year-old Australian parent, was officially diagnosed with young-onset Alzheimer’s.
The illness, sometimes known as early-onset Alzheimer’s, can affect people under the age of 65. The Alzheimer’s Association claims that because Alzheimer’s disease is less common in younger individuals, “health care providers generally don’t look for Alzheimer’s disease in younger people,” making an accurate diagnosis of early-onset Alzheimer’s a “long and frustrating process.” Alzheimer’s is “not a normal part of aging,” according to the group.
Although young-onset Alzheimer’s disease is uncommon, the Mayo Clinic estimates that 110 people between the ages of 30 and 64 have it.
“Very severe memory issues”
Fraser, who is among the extremely unfortunate few who have young-onset Alzheimer’s disease, did not initially have this condition; instead, his symptoms steadily worsened over the period of two years before he received a diagnosis.
I can’t remember the specifics of my earliest symptoms, which makes it amusing. The Australian father said, “I (don’t) have dementia,” in one of the first videos he uploaded to his channel. I only recall having some significant memory problems.
Fraser uses the channel to openly discuss the emotional and mental battle that led to his diagnosis as well as the small warning signs he ignored along the way.
“Yeah, we watched that about a month ago,” my partner commented as I was getting settled to watch a movie. I watched the entire movie, yet the ending still surprised me. I don’t even remember seeing it at all. “It was a little concerning because I didn’t watch many movies at the time either,” said the scholar and teacher.
He didn’t think much about the movie night, though, until he started to have more severe memory loss.
How is my daughter doing?
A pivotal moment in his life was the scary evening he spent driving about trying to find his teenage daughter, whom he thought was missing.
Her father had forgotten that she and he had planned to go to the movies earlier in the day.
During the day, he recounted, “I remember my daughter telling me several times that she was going to the movies that night and that it would be kind of late with a friend.”
As night fell, I started to worry about my child’s whereabouts. I was on my way to the nearby town to see if any of my other pals had heard from her.And I started to worry so much that I almost called the police.
The frightened dad disclosed that he had “been trying to call her, trying to phone message, trying to message her, and just not getting through to her at all.”
“Hey dad, I was just in a movie,” she contacts me after that. Remember what I told you?
“Simple thinking”
He explains that he had initially believed his “earliest symptoms” to be “casual,” but it was his two children who gave him the confidence to recognize them.
I queried my kids in a casual way, and they said that “everyone has memory problems and forgets things in daily life.” We simply saw that you were experiencing these more frequently, which are really common, everyday memory lapses that everyone experiences.
Fraser decided to see a doctor, and in May 2024, he was diagnosed with younger-onset Alzheimer’s.
I didn’t notice I was having trouble thinking clearly and effectively until maybe a few months prior to the diagnosis. He said, “I found that I had more surface level thinking, more shallow thinking,” in reference to his cognitive impairment.
“Crash” mental health
In a more recent video, Fraser informed his 14.3 thousand followers that when he was first diagnosed, he “kind of wanted to put it all out of [his] head” and “not think about it, like six months later, five months.”
However, staying in denial caused his mental health to implode.
Fraser talked about how he started having panic attacks out of the blue and realized that he was attempting to “bury [his] head in the sand” by avoiding the truth.
“But really it’s always in the back of your mind and so I just wasn’t dealing with it,” he said, adding that a psychologist helped him “unpack.”
“The brain is worn out.”
Fraser said he had “forgotten” how to do simple things he has done “a thousand times,” like turning off the shower or driving his partner’s car, as his sickness worsens.
He remarked, “You’re in a haze and can’t really focus on things very well because a fog just comes over your brain.”
Fraser adds, “My brain has had enough.”
Fraser isn’t trying to be a hero; he just wants to be honest. This sincerity is helping to dispel the stigma attached to early-onset dementia and urging others to take notice of the warning signs, even if they seem little.
