This blog is part of a series called the NewOld - a Dementia Trust project exploring difficult topics and points of view.

People looking for a book or article which is meant to be about dementia are often faced with a stark choice between two extremes. On one side you might get a memoir of one person’s experience, dressed up to look as if it is giving insights that you could never get from any other source, and instructing you to do what they think is the correct thing. On the other side you get a something dressed up to look like more generalised knowledge and information, but carrying the usual myths.

This is a bit of a classic example of the personal memoir type of dementia confessional – full of emotion and what people would probably call humanity – but ultimately just a personal piece wrapped up in whatever comes to hand, including the obligatory quote from high art (Beckett this time not a poem).

Still worth a read with your eyes open, but once read you probably don’t need to read another long piece like this ever again. This is the shortened version.