KANSAS CITY, Mo — November marks Alzheimer's Disease Awareness Month and a Kansas City-area woman has stepped up to help educate others on the deadly disease after her mother's diagnosis five years ago.
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Laura Metz, a passionate advocate for Alzheimer's awareness, has been actively volunteering with the Alzheimer's Association in Kansas City to bring attention to the importance of understanding and supporting those affected by the disease.
“I'm no doctor, so I think one of the big things that we would encourage, November is National Alzheimer's Disease Awareness Month as well as Family Caregivers Month," Metz said. "The first step to empathy is education.”
Laura's commitment to the cause stems from her own family's experience with Alzheimer's, when her mother was diagnosed in 2018. Since then, Laura has been working to make a difference in the lives of those impacted by the disease and their families.
“It's a little surreal. You hear about Alzheimer's, and you see it on TV and movies. And so, you immediately kind of have a certain expectation of what the days and months and years ahead might look like. And it's, I think the biggest revelation was it's so personal," Metz said.
She said every person has a different experience with the disease.
“The natural, the progression, the stages, it's all going to affect people differently. And so having that understanding and being able to educate everyone is also part of the goal of the Alzheimer's Association," Metz said.
Through events like Walk to End Alzheimer's Disease, held in Kansas, the community comes together to show their support. This year's walk was Metz's first and seeing others who came out to walk for a loved one made it even more special for her.
"I personally had phenomenal support," Metz said. "I know the impact of having that personal support. I had friends and family that came in town to help provide the walk with us to make sure that we knew that we were not alone in this fight."
This year's Walk to End Alzheimer's Disease raised over $500,000 dollars.
"That's the sign of hope," Metz said. "That's the big thing that the walk does, is it brings hope for, it's always for the future generations. It's something of looking out and seeing, this doesn't have to be as bad as it gets. This can be the worst of it, and we can move forward and we can move on.”
During this National Alzheimer's Disease Awareness Month, Metz is urging the community to join in the fight against this debilitating disease.
“The big effort of this month is to, as I mentioned before, raise awareness. So the basic education, the resources that are available through the Alzheimer's Association, all set to make sure that people have however much information as it pertains to their situation,” she said.
Metz has turned her personal journey into a beacon of hope and resilience for others who might be sharing the same experience of a friend or loved one fighting everyday with the disease. This month specifically reminds her that every day isn't promised, but to make the best of them while she has her mother.
"One of my biggest takeaways in all this was in going through the diagnosis and everything is you don't know what you have until it's gone. So affected with Alzheimer's or not, I would encourage people, call your mom, call your dad, call your loved ones, have a conversation. It's those little things that might fade away faster than you think.”
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