TUESDAY 1 NOVEMBER 2016

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Problems managing money are often a symptom that something is wrong. It could be the beginning of dementia.

WHEN DEMENTIA

HITS P|2-3 02 COVER STORY TUESDAY 1 NOVEMBER 2016 Facing fiscal reality when dementia strikes

complicated the better.” It should have taken about half an hour. Dementia can Instead, two hours later, “the manifest itself in pieces just weren’t going together unpaid bills, giving like I thought they should.” Duncan finally said what they away money needed both knew. He needed to see a doc- for living expenses tor about what was going on in his brain. The diagnosis was Alzheim- to charities or to the er’s, the most common cause of phone and Internet dementia, which can wreak havoc scams or other poor on even the best financial planning for retirement. McClatchey, now financial decisions. living in Albuquerque, considers himself lucky that he was diagnosed in the disease’s early stages, just Martha M Hamilton eight months after his move to Texas. The Washington Post “Some people founder for years and years because the doctors them- selves are afraid to give the diagnosis huck McClatchey had a of early onset Alzheimer’s because sound retirement plan. of what the disease is.” Already retired with Alzheimer’s is incurable, and pensions from two jobs about 5.4 million people in the — one as a US Air Force United States are now living with Association. With the oldest of the the number of people with demen- Cmaster sergeant and the other as it, according to the Alzheimer’s baby boomers turning 70 this year, tia is expected to soar. an electrical operations superin- tendent for 20 years with the Arizona Department of Transpor- tation — he landed another job with the state of Texas working on traf- fic signals and traffic intel systems. He moved to Fort Worth at age 61 with his partner Bobbie Duncan, and they spent $25,000 in savings on a fixer-upper house. His plan was to work until he was 70. But then things got strange. “I was having trouble understanding new technologies and things that I should have known off the top of my head” and having trouble using Word and Excel and PowerPoint, “things I had known for years.” He left that job but had prob- lems in another, simpler job at Lowe’s. Then one day, amid grow- ing confusion, came clarity. “I brought home a little desk for me to put together,” he said. “I love to put things together, the more TUESDAY 1 NOVEMBER 2016 COVER STORY 03

“I think it’s important for people disability at age 61, losing not just having a health-care power of attor- at all,” said Hyman Darling, an attor- to have some awareness that finan- the income he would have earned ney or living will naming someone ney in Springfield, Massachusetts. In cial problems can be some of the from working longer but also you trust to make health-care deci- those cases, the decision will be most notable symptoms” of demen- increased benefits. The best way to sions if you are incapable, made in the courts, which is “emo- tia, said Nina Silverberg, programme avoid problems is to take steps when designating someone to take care of tional, expensive and takes a lot of director of the National Institute on your mental abilities are sound to your finances and having a regular time” if family members disagree Aging’s Alzheimer’s Disease Cent- protect yourself if they fail in the will to distribute your assets when whom it should be. In the meantime, ers Program. Dementia can manifest future. you die. The National Institute on “the bills aren’t getting paid, and you itself in unpaid bills, giving away It’s hard to contemplate. But Aging has a very good fact sheet on can’t sign them into any facility money needed for living expenses here’s a sta