Episode 65. CJD with Barbara Ludwig - Author of No Time to Cry

I am joined in this podcast by Barbara Ludwig to discuss her experience of CJD, the disease that her husband Jürgen died from, and which she narrated in her excellent memoir No Time To Cry. She explained how and why she was able to assume and convey her husband’s perspective of his illness experience, and how she used the title of the book to convey the importance of time in context of illness.

Barbara explored Jürgen’s early symptoms with walking difficulty and anxiety, and how this progressed to disorientation and paranoid jealousy. She also captured the uncertainty that trailed his early diagnostic process as all investigations initially failed to confirm a diagnosis, and the uncertainty of how long he had to live. She discussed how he was initially thought to have multiple sclerosis and then a psychological disorder, and how the diagnos ...