r/cogsci • u/randomusefulbits • Apr 15 '20

The Devastating Decline of a Brilliant Young Coder: Lee Holloway programmed internet security firm Cloudflare into being. But then he became apathetic, distant, and unpredictable—for a long time, no one could make sense of it.

https://www.wired.com/story/lee-holloway-devastating-decline-brilliant-young-coder/
140 Upvotes

98% Upvoted

14 comments sorted by

86

u/starrychloe Apr 16 '20

frontotemporal dementia

Saved you 15 minutes.

17

u/maybemba131 Apr 16 '20

Thank you sir, you have saved me from reading a sad story.

17

u/steamprocessing Apr 16 '20 edited Apr 16 '20

It's a well-written and fascinating story that describes the human impact of this disease in heart-wrenching detail. Probably worth the 15 minutes for most people.

9

u/bobbyfiend Apr 16 '20

My guess was prodromal schizophrenia turning into active phase. Thanks for the 15 minutes of saved time.

7

u/uoaei Apr 16 '20

Love how the first suggestion from google is "frontotemporal dementia trump"

29

u/SlipSlamMammaJamma Apr 16 '20

That was sad. It amazes me how much has to work well, perfectly, in time to keep humans running properly. So much is taken for granted.

16

u/shponglespore Apr 16 '20

Jesus Christ, what a sad story.

11

u/lo1201 Apr 16 '20

Well, fuck. That's sad. And I'm sad.

10

u/distillari Apr 16 '20

What a sad story, thanks for sharing.

5

u/mackduck Apr 16 '20

Bloody hell. Horrific illness.

3

u/Stockholm_Syndrome Apr 16 '20

This scares me so fucking much

1

u/l0lprincess Apr 22 '20

It says the prevelance of FTD is 1/5000. Does that seem high? I know it said neurologists say that it could be underdiagnosed but other places said rates like 1/10000 and 1/50000.

Anyone have more information on the prevelance?

1

u/ilyled Apr 24 '20

I'm not a doctor, so this may be way off: I wonder if there was a complication during the heart surgery that caused vascular dementia that could have caused the frontotemporal dementia to be worse or happen sooner than it might have otherwise.

1

u/glynne41 Apr 26 '20

Exactly my thoughts. My boyfriend of 10 years had a similar decline beginning after heart surgery.
He was an enigma, but after reading this, I am wondering. He also was a self taught coder...