Mum and Me, a Journey with Dementia: A Personal Reflection

Abstract

As I reflect on and write something about our journey, Mum is safe and comfortable and now lives in a nursing home, which works very hard to provide high-quality, person-centred care. She is frail and has complex physical needs and is now deep in dementia. But despite Mum's physical and cognitive frailty, she is still able to express her wish to 'go home'. This is something that causes me great distress and the one thing that I wish I could achieve for her. But at the time of writing, it remains almost impossible to provide the level of care my Mum needs in her own home. My aims in contributing this chapter are twofold: first, to increase awareness of the experience of living with and caring for someone with dementia and second, to highlight the need for integrated, coordinated dementia care throughout a person's journey in dementia. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved)