You may not believe it, or see it, but people with dementia are still being Prescribed Disengagement®, and only supported to die, rather than to live positively. You may not believe it, but if you have a stroke, you will recieve rehabilitation, whereas if you are diagnosed with dementia, you won’t. You may not believe…
There are more than 50 million people living with dementia and a new diagnosis somewhere in the world every 3.2 seconds (WHO). I am one of them. Since my own diagnosis 12 years ago, I went from the depths of despair and hopelessness after being diagnosed, primarily caused by the Prescribed Disengagement®, to becoming a…
On July 1, 2012, I published a blog titled Dr Martin Luther King Jr asked ‘Is it right?” which I have added below, with a few edits or comments made in pink. It is interesting to me to read it again, and for a change, I still agree with most things I wrote back then.…
Once again, I have committed to post a daily blog in September, my feeble attempt at a contribution to Dementia Awareness Month, even though I am under no illusions of the value of doing so. Todays is about not giving up. Those of you who have read my blogs this month will know I have…
We are well over half way through Dementia Awareness Month, and I’m tired, but continuing with my daily blog series, in an effort to create new thinking, and discussion. Some of the topics I’ve chosen are difficult to write about, like this one,. They may even cause offence to others, including causing dissent amongst some…
It’s day 19 of Dementia Awareness Month in 2020, and although I started out this month, thinking that for my usual September daily blog series I would kickstart the #BanBPSD campaign again, I have strayed. That is because there are too many other things I believe are just as important, and even urgent, for me…
In the last year or so, many people with and without dementia have started to document the history of what they perceive as dementia advocacy and/or activism. It almost feels like it is being done, as if to justify that the last more than two decades of advocacy have been worth it, and so I…
It’s an Interesting time in dementia advocacy, and I’m currently witnessing a lot of justification or rationalisation that the last 2+ decades of advocacy have been worth it. In part because of that, I have been reading lots of my old blogs, just to see what I have previously thought and said about things, and…
For many years, I have been saying that people with dementia should be paid just like everyone else. After all, there is big money in dementia, and this particular industry is getting bigger. And it often still seems to be more about Purse Centred Care than Person Centred Care. People with dementa are living with…
It’s no different for people with dementia. Except the effort has not been put into understanding the similarities. If people with dementia are to be blamed for their normal human responses, then it’s time everyone else is too. BPSC-19 has basically proven people with dementia are not much different to anyone else when faced with…
Recently I received an email inviting me to become involved in a new organisation, and also to endorse it. Although I was sent the final Call To Action, and a list of the founding members, I didn’t feel I had enough infomation to do either, without a conversation. When I met with this person, I…
Yesterday Ms. Ita Buttrose, the current Chair of the ABC in Australia, and an Ambassador and a past President of Dementia Australia gave a key note presentation at a Symposium hosted by DA. In the Q&A after her speech, she responded to one mildly defensive comment that there are ‘good aged care providers’, by saying…
Two years ago I published a series of blogs focused on the need to rethink dementia care, to reframe dementia entirely, on dementia as a major cause of disability, but most especially on the need to ban BPSD (Behavioral and Psychological Symptoms of Dementia). The Coronavirus pandemic has almost proven BPSD is a false construct,…
Blogging helps me to capture moments and memories, and has become my personal history file, by way of words and stories embodying feelings and emotions. Blogging to capture my memories and thoughts has now become a significant tool in managing my response to dementia, and something I try to do often. Speaking out through blogging,…
Dementia and me What the hell happened to my braindiagnosed with dementia when I was much too youngmy children still at schoola deadly terminal disease effectingmemory, thinking, perception, judgment, language and speech But worse than that, effecting mylife, family, friendships, my sense of self, my identityand a bucket load of guilttruckloads of stigma discrimination and…
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