Amy Tan Quotes

Dementia is quite unlike cancer or heart disease or any of those other conditions where you bargain with God for a cure or even just a bit more time.

One night some short weeks ago, for the first time in her not always happy life, Marilyn Monroe's soul sat down alone to a quiet supper from which it did not rise.

I don't want to give up living, because I enjoy it so much, and I love working - I don't expect I'll ever have to stop. But Alzheimer's or something like that would render me pretty useless.

I think every human being has a level of melancholy in life and in general.

I think everyone knows someone who's battling with dementia or caring for a relative affected by it. I've been staggered by how commonplace it is.

I do mean this - I had the good fortune of being around a number of Alzheimer's patients in the last three years of my mother's life. She was in a care facility that was devoted to just people with memory-loss issues. I found those people engaging and generous in ways that I had not imagined.

My agenda is trying to help people live a better life.

We participate and are responsible for a lot of the things that happen to us. If you hate your job, you are much more likely to get sick and die at a younger age than someone who's happy at work and has a nice family life and is mentally well adjusted.

There are times in my life when I haven't been happy. Sometimes it's not even physical, it's something else. The key is identifying why you're unhappy and doing whatever you can to fix it in a healthy way.

No one is happy all his life long.

Always leave enough time in your life to do something that makes you happy, satisfied, even joyous. That has more of an effect on economic well-being than any other single factor.

I hate to sound this way but, 'Why me? Why me with dementia?'

Well I don't know that I'm okay any more than anyone else is okay, I lead a happy life and a very full one - I have a happy marriage and my kids are all cheerful, and no one is finding fault with me, personally.

I loved my husband very much, and it was heartbreaking to have him develop Alzheimer's disease, and to stand by and watch him decline in his ability to take care of himself.

My mother had early-onset Alzheimer's, and it took her four years to die. She was only 44; I was 14.

And, in fact, you can find that the lack of basic resources, material resources, contributes to unhappiness, but the increase in material resources do not increase happiness.

Depression, as far as I'm concerned, is just a waste of time.

I spend enough time onscreen looking hangdog and depressed.

I think maybe when you live with someone who is really very ill for a long time, it somehow gives you more of a greedy appetite for life and maybe, yes, you are less measured in your behaviour than you would otherwise be.

I think if you're an unhappy person, you're always going to be an unhappy person. You're probably going to be less unhappy if your business is doing well, if I'm being honest.

No one's really happy anyway, it's not human.

I don't ever expect to be permanently happy. I don't think that's part of the human condition.

I have known healthy, wealthy people who were depressed, and people with critical illnesses who could honestly attest to joy.

My mother passed away of complications of dementia. As you get older, it really makes you realize how many people are touched by this disease.

I've definitely gone through phases where I'm not happy with my life, and you notice in little ways until they start adding up.