As live-in carers we see many clients these days who suffer from dementia. In fact, each client seems to be at a different stage as the disease progresses. So much so that we often do not know where we are though the various stages of dementia.
Here is a way that may make it easier to understand the progress of the disease and the places your client may find themselves at.
Think about a stick of Brighton rock
Not necessarily Brighton rock, in fact, think about a stick of rock from any place. The idea is that the stick of rock can be equated to the memory bank of your client.
The base of the rock is where you will find the earliest memories, namely those from when your client was a baby and a very young child.
As we progress up the stick of rock, we find childhood and teenage memories and finally these become adult memories.
At the very top of the rock, we find all the present-day memories, those that include what we had for dinner last night and what clothes we wore yesterday. This is also where we find the memory of who we recently met and what we did.
Now think about licking the rock
If you can equate licking the rock to dementia you will begin to understand the memory process – or rather the destruction of memories.
The tongue that licks the rock can be likened to the disease which destroys the memory bank. It starts to lick at the top of the rock. This means that the newest memories are becoming erased.
This explains why your client with dementia may not remember what they ate yesterday or that their family telephoned them – those recent memories have simply been erased.
An important thing to note here is that the rock is licked unevenly, not in a smooth way. Memories are not all erased at once. Because the rock is licked unevenly it means that some present memories remain, while others disappear.
As the rock is licked further, the present memories are no longer there. This is why our client with dementia seems to be living in the past. In their mind, they are living in the present because those are the latest memories that they have.
This disappearance of present memories may explain why your client never remembers your name – you simply have not been in their memory bank for as long as the neighbor next door.
As the rock disappears..
As the rock is licked away, so are your client’s memories erased. It may seem to us that our client is living out their childhood again – and this is literally what is happening to them.
It should also explain why they ‘forget’ how to do some things. They have not forgotten - they just have no memory of how to do it anymore. It is as if they had never learned how to tie a shoelace or work the tv by using the remote.
As the disease progresses, we can expect our client to remember less and less and be unable to do daily activities without our help.
As the rock is licked away their memory bank is further depleted and even people from their youth will no longer be recognizable.
Final thoughts
Dementia is one of the cruelest diseases because it destroys memories we hold dear. People who suffer from this seem to simply fade away, leaving behind people who cannot understand why their loved one does not know them anymore.
Perhaps knowing this process, and equating it to the behavior of the person suffering from it will help us to be more understanding of how it must feel to have precious memories erased
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