By Lori Aden and Sheila Parsley, Texas, USA Our mother got lost driving home from the nail salon back in 2014. At the time, she lived in California, and we lived in Texas. We knew she was having trouble with her memory because she constantly repeated...
By Marianne Sciucco, New York, USA As Mother’s Day approaches we wish all of our readers a happy holiday weekend. We understand that many of you may be grieving the loss of your mother, or perhaps missing the mom whom dementia is slowly stealing away...
By Marianne Sciucco, New York, USA In celebration of National Poetry Month, we hosted a gathering of poets on April 18th to share work inspired by their dementia experiences. Why poetry? We understand that storytelling, of any kind, but especially th...
By Patrick J. McTaggart, Scotland In May 2022, I published a collection of poems in the book “Our Dementia Journey,” charting my family’s experiences with dementia since my dad’s diagnosis. It included reflections from my dad’s perspective as well as...
By Kari Loya, Texas, USA For decades, my dad and I dreamed about cycling across the United States on the TransAmerica Bike Trail, 4,200 miles along mostly backroads from Yorktown, Virginia to Astoria, Oregon. The TransAm was originally set up in 1976...
By Claire Pentecost, PhD, Exeter, United Kingdom Our film, “The World Turned Upside Down,” began as a conversation-starting play, linked to the IDEAL dementia research programme. IDEAL stands for “Improving the Experience of Dementia and Enhancing Ac...
By Jennifer Randazzo, Pennsylvania, USA When my dad was diagnosed with Lewy Body Dementia 18 years ago, we were initially told that he had two terrible diseases — Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s. He began to display cognitive, sleep and behavioral sympto...
By Felicia Mitchell, Virginia, USA Years ago, I had a disconcerting dream. Downstairs in my childhood home, I was talking to my mother. When I looked up the stairs, there she was, sweeping. What did it mean to have two mothers? I remained haunted by...
By Marianne Sciucco, New York, USA An Invitation April is National Poetry Month Please join us for a virtual celebration of poetry for the dementia journey on Tuesday, April 18th at 2 pm EST on Zoom. A community of poets who have all written poetry...
By Theresa WIlbanks, Florida, United States Emma Smith, the author of The Far Cry, said, “Life is like the river, sometimes it sweeps you gently along and sometimes the rapids come out of nowhere.” The river is an excellent metaphor for life. For me,...