My 87 year old Mother in Law has dementia and lives with us. Last year she became very confused, withdrawn and depressed. Her Dr. first prescribed a mild antidepressant for the depression. She was on it about a month and seemed better (the crying and hand wringing and feeling of worthlessness was better). He then gave her Aricept. Within a month, the withdrawl and confusion was better but she became verbally agressive (she is normally the most positive and kind person I have ever met). He then put her on Namenda to take along with the Aricept. Her mood improved GREATLY! The confusion (although still very much there at times) was better, her judgement and understanding skills inproved. It was a Godsend combination of medications for us. Most days 5 minutes ago never happened for her (short term memory is not good at all) but she is happy, pleasant and a joy to be with again. I think it depends on the person--everyone seems to react differently to the medications. We figured it was worth a shot to try the combination, life had become so miserable for her. She truly seems content and happy presently. I wish you luck!

Today my kids (6th grade DS, 8th grade DD) got home made apple pie for dessert in their lunches. We celebrated Pi day yesterday (3.14) with, of course, pie. Quiche for dinner and apple pie for dessert. Good dessert left overs today! Usually their lunches consist of a plain sandwich for DD (just bread and salami - that's what she likes!), with fruit, water, dessert. DS likes a mega sandwich -- a few kinds of meat, lettuce, tomato, cheese on a roll; plus the sides. Sometimes they do hot lunches, with soup or left over pasta or meat in a Thermos. DS is more adventurous - he likes to add salsa and other things to sandwiches. And he put extra hot sauce in our very spicy gumbo on Mardi Gras, while DD was reaching for her water glass due to the spice. I usually work from a home office, so I mostly eat left overs. Occassional trips to Whole Foods for sushi. Yum. When I work from our downtown office, I eat wherever my office buddies are going, and I pack some fruit in my brief case. (Clementines are perfect to-go food, IMO.) Lax - great pics! I'm coming to your house for lunch today.

"I can blame gardenweb for some of my dissatisfaction ... there have been instances where I was blissfully unaware of my mistakes until they were pointed out to me here." LOL. I hear you sister! I would add Houzz to the list. I think that Houzz creates totally unrealistic expectations about houses - just like beauty magazines and media in general have totally distorted our perception of female beauty. It is so sad to see 14 year old girls starving themselves so they could look like the "cover girls". No amount of explaining that the pictures have been photo-shopped, air-brushed, etc. does any good. I am not going to post my kitchen - or any part of the house - on Houzz and yet, I am trying - mostly subconsciously - to "measure up" to the ones I have seen there. I know it'd be unfair to compare GW to Houzz b/c people here are trying to help, not discourage, but it is the cumulative impression that perfection is possible that is "killing" me. :-) In this remodel, I pulled my hair out after each finished stage and absolutely hated it. And every time - thankfully - I felt different the next morning. Though it is too soon to tell, I am sure that the final product will be totally "acceptable". But I cannot get rid of a nagging feeling that I got carried away in my sub-conscious "competition" with online designer kitchens (many of which might have been staged) and spent too much money on this remodel (money I'll probably never "recover" when we sell the house). It's funny, my DH said exactly the same thing yesterday - to remember that the remodeled bathroom or kitchen is not my life - there are other (more important) things to think about. :-) (edited for typos) This post was edited by eleena on Sat, Apr 20, 13 at 18:09

A FUNNY STORY. A few years ago my friend and I went to Las Vegas. She had a brother from California who was going to meet her there and I had a friend there. We live 4 hours from Sioux Falls SD. We had to drive down there, get on the plane and go to St. Louis and then straight out to Vegas. Well we got there without any problems. It was time to comeback and we got to the airport early and my friend told me to wait for her while she went to a smokers hut for one last cigarette. She said I cant get on the plane without you I will leave my boarding pass with you. I went to play some machines in the lobby there and there is no clock so you dont know what time it is. She came back and didnt see me and thought that I had gotten on the plane without her. She told the stewardess this and they went on the plane and paged me. Well it was time for the plane to be leaving so someone else told her they would just make her a new boarding pass. SHe got on the plane and first thought that they had just given her a new seat. Well she got up and couldnt find me. So she sits down and tell the stewardess " I think I just left my friend in Vegas" she says no maybe not so she checks her seat chart and asks what my name was so she checks the whole plane and says looks like you did. So my friend goes on tho St. Louis. Meanwhile I am still waiting for her to come back. Then I notice that the place is empty. I go up to someone and ask them and they tell me I just missed my plane. This is the first time I have ever flown on a big airplane. I flew once beforeon a 4 passenger one on a 3 hour flight. So I asked him what I should do. He told me to go down stairs and see if I can get on the next flight. SO I sm running down there and I had to stop because I am having an anziety attack and couldnt breathe. I got a ticket for the next flight and had to wait another 2 1/2 hours. My friend found out that I was on the next flight. She got to St. Louis and went to the ticket counter and asked if she should just keep going to Sious Falls or wait for me there. The clerk said "Honey if your friend didnt knnow enough to get one in Vegas, she sure will be lost here I think you better wait. So she got to sit in the airport all day. Well I finally got there and I didnt know if she would be waiting for me. I saw her and I was so happy. We went into a smokers hut and we were laughing so hard we were crying. Im sure everyone was looking at us. The first plane we were supposed to be on had mechanical trouble so we had to change planes. But it was in a different tarmack quite a ways away. we didnt have much time to get there. She is a nurse and there was an elderly lady that was having trouble and she was trying to help her and I didnt think we would make it, but we did. I was supposed to be at work by 6:00 the next morning. She said she would drive home and I could sleep and we would still make it. I said OK. We got to Sioux Falls and he couldnt land the plane because of fog. He tried a couple of times and then they announce we are going back to St. Louis. Mt feind wasnt very happy because she had just spent all day there. This was in April I think. We got to St. Louis and they said the plane was leaving at 5 the next morning and they werent putting us up in a motel. Well some of the more experienced flyers grabbed pillows and blankets, but not me. I had on shorts and a short sleeved shirt. This is in April and it wasnt very warm but it was when I left Vegas. My luggage is in SF. I told my friend that a few weeks ago I had read in a Readers Digest that most big airports had a chapel and I asked her if she wanted to go there with me because I thought they would have pews that we could lay on. She told me "If you think Im going any place with you again you are crazy and if your not here in :the morning im leaving your butt here" I went to the chapel and everyone else must have read that same magazine. People were laying all over and covering up with anything they could find including the rugs. Well I was cold and the only thing left was the altar cloth. So I used it and I thought Godf wouldnt want me to be cold and he would forgive me. It took me a long time to finally tell my mother that. Ny oarents were very strong Catholics. Well the next morning we left at 5 and got to SF and it was still foggy he tried 3 times and finally found a hole to come down in. Now I blame my friend and she blames me but we are still friends and still joke about it a lot. I hope you all enjoy this story. My husband got stranded once on the Interstate in ND when he was hauling mail to Fargo from Bismarck. A blizzard came up and they were stranded in a rest area and we didnt know where he was for a while.