LITERARY LAS VEGAS

Advertisement

"How do you maintain your courage when your beloved husband is suddenly diagnosed with Alzheimer's Disease? Feeling helpless and hopeless, how do you find the strength to smile when inside you are dying a slow death?"

Anthem resident Helene Moore asks this question to open her autobiography, "Behind the Mask." The book began as a secret journal she poured her heart into after her husband, Howard Moore, was diagnosed with dementia. The journal, filled with letters, poems and personal thoughts, served as Helene Moore's only emotional outlet because she and her husband chose to keep his condition private to protect his career as a top toy company executive. The author is using her book as a platform to encourage people to adopt caregivers. More information on the book and her adopt-a-caregiver program can be found on her Web site at www.helenemoore.com.

Excerpt from "Behind the Mask"

Howard left me a note. "Good morning lover, I slept okay. Up at 7 remembering how I held you last night. I love you. Pop Pop."

He is forgetting things, names of shows, names of people and showing some signs of depression, but who can blame him. It's a devastating time, watching yourself disintegrate and looking for the next symptoms to rise up and smack you in the face.

I hurt for him, and my body hurts all the time from the stress and the colder weather. I am still losing clumps of my hair. Thank goodness I have plenty.

Howard spoke to Charles, CEO of Toys R Us and a true friend for forty years, and mentioned he had a few neurological problems. Howard worked as General Merchandise Manager and was Executive Vice President, responsible for all merchandise purchases in the United States for ten years and after he retired he stayed on the Board. It will be a terrible shock within the toy industry when Howard's condition becomes known.