I found eight minutes in the dementia ‘Tardis’ disorientating and distressing but it can improve understanding and care for those with the conditionI am standing clenching and releasing my fists. There is a confusion of noises in my ears and I can’t see properly. I try to pick up a cup and it tips over. A loud bang startles me. It must be a door slamming. I know this,but it sounds like a gunshot and someone is pointing something at me. Instinctively, I lean away and put my hands out to shield myself. I’m anxious, or distressed,fearful. A shadowy person tells me to “enact something useful but how can I? She hands me an object. I don’t know what it is and it feels gummy so I put it down. I sit on a sofa, hold on to the fluffy teddy I find there, or wait.
Anyone who has cared for someone with dementia will recognise many of the behaviours I hold just exhibited: standing still in the middle of a room,knocking things over, failing to follow directions, and not knowing what to enact with an ordinary object,cowering, sitting staring into space. So why was I behaving like this?Continue reading...
Source: theguardian.com