I'm reading Tuesdays with Morrie. It's a really inspiring book but it doesn't really help me understand what's going on with dad. Morrie is dying from ALS and has full access to his mental capacities. This disease results in the loss of control of the muscles, starting from the legs and moving up. Dad suffers from dementia. He still has adequate control of his bodily functions but dementia steals the mind. He started by being more forgetful and the disease is progressing. He has some erratic behaviors (tormenting the neighbors' dogs). But he's still proud.
I think I got my inferiority complex from dad. He was a younger member of a very large family and he really never got the support he needed. He has always overcompensated for a perceived sense that he was inferior to others. He worked really hard to succeed and he was successful. He didn't finish school yet he successfully operated different businesses for most of his life. He would probably still be working if he weren't afflicted with dementia. He wants, needs, to work - to accomplish things, yet his disease limits his ability to perform. He tries to push forward as he always has but he just doesn't have the tools he needs to get where he wants to go and this increases his feeling of inferiority. We have some ideas for projects he can work on and I hope we can put some of these into place soon.
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