Mary's Place

http://www.angelfire.com/ok4/mari5113/index.html

1st Place for the Year 2001

Mary Lockhart has early-onset Alzheimer's. Before she was diagnosed,

she had managed a licensed day care for infants for fifteen years.

She misses the babies she cared for, but she has three little dogs

which she enjoys, as well as having an acquarium, and feeding birds

and squirrels. She is doing a wonderful job telling her story on her

home page, Mary's Place, where she shares her daily journal, family

photos, memories from her childhood, links to other sites, and a

chats for other patients like herself. Mary says "This is a very

lonely disease. If I can help one person with my page it will all be

worth it."



ElderCare Online

http://www.ec-online.net/

2nd Place for the Year 2001

With a weekly email newsletter, The Eldercare Beacon, the Eldercare

Forum message board, scheduled chats hosted by other caregivers,

professionals and guest moderators, and tons of information on the

site, ElderCare Online is truly a beacon for caregivers. Impressive

awards and reviews received by this site include: Alzheimer's Site of

the Week at About.com, featured on CNN/Time, in Time Magazine, and in

Smart Money. If you haven't already, you'll want to subscribe to the

very informative Eldercare Beacon newsletter to keep up to date on

all that is going on at ElderCare Online and so you won't miss out

on some of the best articles you can read about issues involved in

Alzheimer's and caregiving.



My Journey

http://www.zarcrom.com/users/alzheimers/chip.html

3rd Place for the Year 2001

Chip Gerber is 55, and he was diagnosed with Alzheimer's in 1997. He

worked for over 25 years as a licensed social worker. His daily

journal is online, accented by the always beautiful designs of

Webmaster Marsha Penington of Alzheimer's Outreach. Chip's journal

is unique in that it is not just an account of what he does every

day, but it is a collection of his thoughts, feelings, and

reflections on his journey with Alzheimer's. He expresses his

appreciation of and delight in ordinary things, including his senses

of smell, sight, and touch as he cherishes nature and the changing

seasons. Chip gives us a beautiful way to look at life, in spite of

our losses.



Alzheimer's Outreach

http://www.zarcrom.com/users/alzheimers/

4th Place for the Year 2001

A totally amazing site, one that inspires awe and wonder every time

we visit, is Marsha Penington's (aka Tay, or Taylor Austin)

Alzheimer's Outreach. Her informational directories on Alzheimer's,

other dementias, and caregiving issues includes around 250 full-text

documents. There is a poetry gallery full of poetry by Steven

Stoker, Jerry Ham, Brenda Race, and Dorothy Womack, and Marsha has

provided Web space for the various works of other caregivers and

Alzheimer's patients throughout her site. At the Alzheimer's

Outreach site, family caregivers and patients alike have shared their

photos, memories, memorials, thoughts, and the list goes on and on.

There is so much this site offers, it's difficult to even begin to

describe it all. Marsha's own story of her mother's Alzheimer's,

along with beautifully designed backgrounds and graphics by Marsha

herself, add a personal touch and intensify the sense of awe we feel

as we visit this wonderful site. Futhermore, Alzheimer's Outreach is

also the large and very active local community service/support group

that is coordinated by Marsha in the area where she lives. Locally

through this group and around the world via the Internet, Marsha's

Alzheimer's Outreach is for so many an excellent source of

information and support at all stages of the Alzheimer's/caregiving

journey.



AlzWell

http://www.alzwell.com/

5th Place for the Year 2001

Susan Grossman was caregiver to her mother-in-law, and this award-

winning site grew out of that experience. Alzwell includes many

interactive features, such as "The Anger Wall", and is the home of

the Caregiver Webring. Alzwell is packed full of information and

opportunities for others to share their stories. Susan's site has

been highly reviewed and received several prestigious awards, even

appearing in Yahoo Internet Life's Touched by the Net. After her

mother-in-law died, Susan continued regularly updating her site and

keeps people informed about updates through her Keepin' Up with

ALZwell newsletter. More recently the site has also joined with

ElderCare Online, displaying an even more professional look and is

providing more services to caregivers.



Undying Love

http://denver.rockymountainnews.com/undyinglove

6th Place for the Year 2001

Undying Love was created by Patrick Davidson, a journalist, about his

mother who died of Alzheimer's. Undying Love tells the story of the

toll this disease took on his mother and the whole family through

excellent black and white photos, the wonderfully written story, and

even Real Audio throughout so we can listen as Patrick shares his

feelings. Undying Love is the one of the most beautiful sites I've

ever seen. The emotions all of us know as caregivers and family

members are expressed so completely, and the beautiful way this story

is told moves me to tears, again and again, every time I visit this

wonderful site. Patrick's site is a moving memorial to his mother and

a place where we can go where we can say "Yes, I feel those

emotions", shed some tears, and heal.



Caregiver's Army

http://www.caregiversarmy.org/

7th Place for the Year 2001

The Alzheimer's Disease Caregiver's Army, founded September 1999, has

launched a worldwide petition drive in support of finding a cure for

Alzheimer's Disease and for helping caregivers. Their goal is to

collect a million signatures, and several months ago spokesperson,

Carolyn Haynali, presented the first 20,000 signatures in Washington

DC. The Army has an impressively professional Web site, providing

Alzheimer's information, statistics about this disease, and featuring

photos of Carolyn meeting Congressmen. The Army mailing list/support

group which can be subscribed to at

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/CAREGIVERSARMY

Hearing Carolyn interviewed last year on the Don & Carla Show,

I must say I was impressed, and I can't think of a better

spokesperson. For her husband, Chuck, who has Alzheimer's, and for

caregivers and patients everywhere, Carolyn and the Caregiver's Army

are busy fighting this disease that has so affected all our lives.



Passage into Paradise

http://www.geocities.com/womack47/passage.html

8th Place for the Year 2001

Dorothy's book, Passage into Paradise, is her caregiving journal kept

during her time as caregiver for her mother. It is a huge book--

around 200 pages printed out, presented as 25 pages online-- but it

is one that the reader will "not want to put down" until finished.

Dorothy has given us not only her mother's journey with Alzheimer's,

but also the thoughts, feelings, doubts, and pain of a caregiver--

even one who is a woman of great faith. Dorothy's moving poetry and

beautiful photos of her mother are also included, and soft nature and

angel backgrounds help make the book a pleasure to read. Passage into

Paradise has been awarded the Alzheimer's Site of the Week at

About.com and a Suite101 Featured Online Book. Dorothy is a writer

for Today's Caregiver (Caregiver.com), Empowering Caregivers, and her

poems and articles are featured at several other Web sites, including

Alzheimer's Outreach, A Year to Remember, and Poetry.com.  And hot

off the press, Dorothy's books: Passage into Paradise, Alzheimer's

Angels, and Sacred Sentiments, have all just been published in the

past couple of months (August and September 2002) by Writer's Club

Press / iUniverse.com.  (I'll write more about Dorothys' books very

soon on my other list, Alzheimer's/Caregiving Book Reviews)



Caregiver's Haven

http://www.nhisgarden.com/caregivers/entrance.html

9th Place for the Year 2001

Nancy Walker is nurse who has 22 years of experience with caring for

the elderly and dementia patients. She has taken on Alzheimer's as her

cause and as well as providing information about AD, she has created

a true haven for weary caregivers and early-onset patients alike.

Her site features a Poetry Niche, which includes the poems of Dorothy

Womack, Brenda Race, Carolyn Haynali, Tim Brennan and others, and a

Gallery which displays paintings by Dorothy Womack's mother and some

selections from the Brace Alzheimer's Research Art Gallery. Nancy's

wish for us as we visit her site is "To sit back and find a relaxing

site filled with love, peace and maybe a laugh or too", and she

is doing a wonderful job at reaching that goal. Despite her former

server's losing her Web site files in the past couple of years, Nancy

has restored her site and continued to develop it even, amazing us

with all she accomplishes in addition to her busy career.



Poems, Prayers, and Promises

by Brenda Race

http://www.geocities.com/brace03/Mom.html

10th Place for the Year 2001

Brenda cared for her mother at home until she entered a nursing home

in December 1998. She was still with her every chance she got until

her mother died about a year later in December 1999. Brenda's site,

Poems, Prayers, and Promises, is unique in that it gives a positive

look at the nursing home experience, through her poetry and photos.

Brenda has collected her thoughts, memories, photos, and poems

from all stages in her journey with her mother and Alzheimer's,

and she has illustrated them all so wonderfully with beautiful

backgrounds and graphics. She also has included some poems that

Dorothy Womack wrote for her during her times of grief after her

mother's entrance into the nursing home and as the disease

progressed, taking more and more of her mother from her. It's a

wonderful site, full of beautiful poetry, great photos and

graphics, and tremendous spiritual insight.



Congrats to all of these wonderful sites!  And, I am actually about

to get caught up here in a few months, maybe ...



Beginning with the year 2002, only one site has been chosen per

month, and this has been done randomly by the TopSites program.  This

change was to reduce my time spent managing that list, thus to

eventually help me catch up with this email list, and also to give

others besides those with the most votes to have a chance to win.  At

the end of the year, however, there will again be ten winning sites,

those coming in at the top with votes, just as before.



Best wishes to all!



Brenda

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Brenda Parris Sibley

A Year to Remember... http://www.zarcrom.com/users/yeartorem/

author of Waiting for the Morning, iUniverse.com ISBN:0-595-18782-X

http://www.iuniverse.com/bookstore/book_detail.asp?isbn=0%2D595%

2D18782%2DX

http://bpsibley.150m.com/wmf.html

Owner, Top Alzheimer's/Caregiving Sites

http://new.topsitelists.com/bestsites/bpsibley/topsites.html

Editor, Alzheimer's Disease Topic at Suite101

http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/alzheimers_disease

Editor, Top Alzheimer's/Caregiving Sites Community at iUniverse

http://communities.iuniverse.com/bin/circle.asp?circleid=6622

Owner, Top Alzheimer's/Caregiving Sites Newsletter

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/TopADCaregivingSites/

Owner, Alzheimer's/Caregiving Book Reviews

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ADbkreviews/

Easy, Affordable Community Education available at Suite101 University:

http://www.suite101.com/suiteu/default.cfm/261435

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~