Christina Lee reviews one woman’s powerful story of sharing a life with a partner living with dementia.
Since getting involved with the Rochester Literature Festival and talking to families of people with dementia at the Memory Café, I decided to read up on dementia to learn more about it and took out Rachael Dixey’s Our Dementia Diary from the library.
As you know, we’re greatly involved with both the Kent and Medway Dementia Action Alliances, which has informed our Memory Box project in adapting to different groups of people telling us their stories.
Dementia Memory Cafes are a growing resource across the country for people living with dementia and their carers, to come together for support and to combat social isolation.
We dropped into the Rochester cafe last week on what would have been Sir Terry Pratchett’s 69th birthday, taking along a few Quantum Weather Butterflies and some random reminiscence items, thus combining The Turtle Moves with The Memory Box.
The Rochester cafe is organised by Alzheimer’s volunteer John Portman and takes place on the last Friday in the month at St.Peter’s Church in The Delce from 1.30-3.30pm. There’s plenty of free, on street parking and a warm welcome awaits you.
The wonderful Christina takes a closer look at the reasons why the Cultural Arm of the Kent DAA created and delivered the Creative Care Expo.
Creative Care and Dementia
The Cultural Arm of the Kent Dementia Action Alliance hosted a very successful Creative Care Expo in Maidstone in early February, which showcased the fantastic projects happening across the county to engage older people, and those with dementia or Alzheimer’s, through creative arts.
A quick walk around the exhibition centre found stalls displaying sculptures, painted tiles, decorated boxes, and a person singing on a guitar. Rochester Literature Festival led two taster Reminiscence sessions in the spirit of the Memory Box project, which were very well-received and enjoyed by everyone who attended.
We’re fresh from our first activity of the year, the successful Creative Care Expo in Maidstone, where practical experience confirmed once again that arts and culture play a significant part in wellbeing.
Rochester Literature Festival 