I sort of get this but I don’t think a visual media is the best way to get it across. This just tells me that people with dementia see the world the same way I do, but make terrible nonsensical decisions. None of the behaviors seem to relate to the images we see, like the cupboard and the fridge don’t look confusing, she just puts the stuff in the wrong place.
A couple of months ago I was out walking my dog and I passed by a house where an old woman in her night gown was just pacing around her front yard. When she saw me she started yelling, “HELP! HELP! CALL 911!”
So I rushed over and she’s obviously very confused. She told me that something bad had happened and that I needed to call 911. I asked her, “What happened?” and she just stammered like the lady in this video and said “Uh, I don’t know. I don’t know, something bad.”
Then this man, probably in his late 50’s comes out of the house. He explains he’s her son, she has dementia and gets confused sometimes. But I swear for a hot second I’m looking at these two thinking… “Does she have dementia? Is he her son? Do I need to call the cops?”
It’s a terrible thing. My grandmother recently developed it, she’s in a care facility so no grocery shopping for her. She’ll need to ask you three times what kind of soup she’s eating, but without hesitation will pick up a conversation we had at last week’s dinner with questions she’s been thinking about since then. It’s really a minefield, because you don’t want to acknowledge their dementia and freak them out. Half the time they are of 100% sound mind and can’t fathom that something is wrong in their brain. But the other half of the time they know there’s something wrong and they try to fake their way through it to avoid the embarrassment. It really is just something you need to be empathetic about because there’s no fixing the situation.
Didn’t show granny dropping her trousers and crapping in the middle of the store and also petting invisible cats. It’s horrible watching a loved one decline like this.
I’ve worked in the dementia space and I think this is a really good message. We are all so busy in our day-to-day lives that we are often unaware of the struggles experienced by others. A little bit of consideration and understanding go a long way.
I was struck by how much people were dicks and wouldn’t help her. I feel like.. a smaller portion of people would be unhelpful like that IRL. But a good message nonetheless.
It’s so hard for me to not blame people with mild mental illnesses for their behavior. Like cognitively I know they aren’t able to execute the same mental functions as the average person but emotionally what I see in front of me is someone acting in a disruptive manner. Fortunately, I’m not a total asshole so I keep all that to myself.
Man the exact same situation with the debit card happened to my grandpa who has dementia now. We would always go get out to eat but first stop at his bank to withdraw money. We did this 100s of times over the last 10 years & then one time he couldn’t figure out how to use the same machine he’s been using so I had to help him. Depressing stuff.
I wish I had seen it coming earlier with my mum. She always told us not to worry about her.
Yet she was always on about her phone not working properly, or that she just couldn’t figure out why certain things in the house were having power issues. Or something as simple as changing stuff to the right channel on the tv. I live overseas, and she lived by herself and could up until a few years ago take good care of herself. She could also use a pc and a phone.
One day I had her on facetime and I noticed the ungodly amount of paperwork just thrown across the place, just everywhere. She told me a few people had visited her asking about money. When I called the week after her phone was dead, her mobile was cut off, I could not email her, or text. So I sent someone to go check on her. Well.. What they found was not pretty at all. She had basically resorted to living downstairs and sleeping on the couch, on all the papers she had gathered from stored away files to try and find out if she had paid her bills. She was certain she paid everything last Friday at the post-office. Unfortunately the last paid bill she paid was a gas bill and it was from six months ago. In her mind, she did it last Friday. Underneath those papers, were half eaten bananas, half eaten sandwiches, and other food from maybe weeks even months ago. Toilets were not flushed. The people that had been round were debt collectors. They literally did not give a fuck they had an old person with dementia in front of them, they were just there to collect. According to her she also let these people in her home as they seemed friendly. I am certain they would have gone through her stuff to find anything of value. She kept up an appearance that everything was fine. Maybe to her everything WAS fine. I think the only thing that didn’t get cut off was gas and electricity, but I am sure that would have been next. The campaign to get herself and her affairs back in order took almost a years worth of work. I later learned that when she did go outside she would end up in other peoples gardens, rather than where she was going. All those people only got annoyed and called the cops on her, who also never contacted us about what was happening. She would have been frightened and confused about all that.
Fast forward now a few years later, she has rapidly declined. She’s in a nursing home now.
It goes so bloody fast. She can still walk, she knows who we all are, she can recall certain things if it’s to do with the past and talk our ears off about it. Just every day things such as, who called, who visited, who’s voice is talking, what did I do this morning, what am I going to do today, why is there a vase there? etc. It sends her into so much confusion and panic.
The best thing is just to be positive with her, keep things extremely simple, don’t linger on long conversations for too long, and not treating her like an outcast of society. There will be moments of confusion and panic sure, but it helps in those situations to keep things moving and redirecting things to a positive place by being helpful and friendly. Sometimes it’s so hard to think and beat yourself up about ‘oh did I say that right’ or ‘I hope I didn’t do anything in a deceptive manner’ to add to the confusion. If your loved one is smiling, and not confused or panicking, then you did it right.
So whenever a crazy old lady asks for chicken cheese I have to stop what I’m doing and help them find it?
That sounds like a Hormel product that would come in a can.
I’ve been lucky so far with my grandparents. They’re both in their late 80s now and they’re definitely running at significantly reduced capacity, but still functional and can live by themselves (with daily visits and phone calls).
Nope. This doesn’t show the inability to process patterns or how disorienting repetitious spaces look. Like literally these are the known issues that dementia-friendly designs address.
Look at a series of ones: 111111111111111111111. Now try to count them quickly. That’s basically what the world looks like/feels like for someone with dementia. It’s your brain constantly drawing the wrong conclusions of your surroundings, meaning you’re in manual-mode for the most basic things. Really a missed opportunity to show visually what that feels like.
I loved how the flat was changing so even we as an audience were never quite sure where he was or who was who. I really loved this film and recommend it!
This hits home so hard…it makes me feel so bad as this is a growing problem…the saddest thing is you see it every day, and you also see the impatience and intolerance of other people! No one cares, or helps anyone anymore!
If you had shown me a smart phone 30 years ago I would have shit my pants.
My hope is that by time I am old we can just download into something. We maybe have a more natural cure. Maybe I get a cyborg brain or some tech augmentation that is at the stage of wide public use.
Although this video is specifically about dementia, it reminds me how utterly terrifying the prospect of growing old and living alone is.
Not everybody develops dementia, but we all grow old and our cognitive abilities decline over time. If we live long enough, we will eventually need assistance just to live. Think about all those nursing homes filled with people who spend the final years of their lives lonely and dependent. That’s the future for a lot of us, and it’s fucking scary.
I honestly don’t know why we don’t freak out more about growing old. Or maybe plenty of people do freak out about it, but we just don’t talk about it openly. Like nobody taught me how to accept and prepare for things like gradual cognitive and physical decline, or the eventual need for living assistance. I guess we’re all expected to just figure this shit out on our own.
Lost both grandmothers to dementia related complications within a week of one another last year. Truly an awful disease, seeing such proud caring women’s whole life being reduced to nothing slowly over the course of several years. Seeing someone that loved you unconditionally slowly forget who you even are. The worst was the few moments where they would have lucid moments and it was like nothing had changed only for it all to be ripped away and watching them die all over again.
I lost both grandfathers to this. I already decided that if the doc says I got it, I’m eating a bullet. I’m not going out that way. I saw a powerful man fall back to being a baby and the toll it took on my grandmother… I’m not doing that.
This reminds me of a time where something like this happened.
I work in a big office building downtown that has ~30 floors. Went on break with a friend when we when we arrived at our floor, i saw this older lady trying to swipe a card to access the doors for the floor (card kept getting denied) and we didn’t recognize her. My friend looked at me with a look of “who is that?”. I went up to her and asked if i could help her with the card. She then looked at me and said “Oh I’m just trying to get to my room”. I looked at her card and notice she was holding a hotel room keycard from the hotel just next door. I went “oh dear seems like we’re in the wrong location! let me help you get to your room” I asked her to hold on to my arm and down we went and walked to the next building. chatting about how she was from England and traveling with family etc. Anyway, we get to the hotel lobby and a younger women dashes towards us. she seemed to be a panicked state. anyway she runs over and explained they’ve been looking for her for some time and management was about to call the police. I explained she was just next door in the office building looking for her room and when i figured it out brought her here. You can’t imagine how releived they were.
Went back to the office and my buddy was like “how did you catch all of that, i was just gonna walk past her” I explained i had a grandfather die from Alzheimer and that i can read into these type of situations.
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Wow.
I don’t live in the UK, but that experience would be frustrating and confusing anyways.
I feel like I have to recommend watching The Father after seeing this
Well I hated this
Was like a POV of an out of control anxiety nightmare
Always be friendly and helpful to what appears to be lost and confused elders. It’s our responsibility to help them.
I sort of get this but I don’t think a visual media is the best way to get it across. This just tells me that people with dementia see the world the same way I do, but make terrible nonsensical decisions. None of the behaviors seem to relate to the images we see, like the cupboard and the fridge don’t look confusing, she just puts the stuff in the wrong place.
A couple of months ago I was out walking my dog and I passed by a house where an old woman in her night gown was just pacing around her front yard. When she saw me she started yelling, “HELP! HELP! CALL 911!”
So I rushed over and she’s obviously very confused. She told me that something bad had happened and that I needed to call 911. I asked her, “What happened?” and she just stammered like the lady in this video and said “Uh, I don’t know. I don’t know, something bad.”
Then this man, probably in his late 50’s comes out of the house. He explains he’s her son, she has dementia and gets confused sometimes. But I swear for a hot second I’m looking at these two thinking… “Does she have dementia? Is he her son? Do I need to call the cops?”
It’s a terrible thing. My grandmother recently developed it, she’s in a care facility so no grocery shopping for her. She’ll need to ask you three times what kind of soup she’s eating, but without hesitation will pick up a conversation we had at last week’s dinner with questions she’s been thinking about since then. It’s really a minefield, because you don’t want to acknowledge their dementia and freak them out. Half the time they are of 100% sound mind and can’t fathom that something is wrong in their brain. But the other half of the time they know there’s something wrong and they try to fake their way through it to avoid the embarrassment. It really is just something you need to be empathetic about because there’s no fixing the situation.
I recommend checking out the HBO documentary “The Alzheimer’s Project”
It’s both heartbreaking and terrifying.
So basically no one gives a fuck in the UK lol
I worked at a bank, this is not how we responded to mumbling, obvious confused elderly people
Didn’t show granny dropping her trousers and crapping in the middle of the store and also petting invisible cats. It’s horrible watching a loved one decline like this.
I’ve worked in the dementia space and I think this is a really good message. We are all so busy in our day-to-day lives that we are often unaware of the struggles experienced by others. A little bit of consideration and understanding go a long way.
wtf have these people not heard of chicken cheese, I too get this way when I’m out
I was struck by how much people were dicks and wouldn’t help her. I feel like.. a smaller portion of people would be unhelpful like that IRL. But a good message nonetheless.
I work at a nursing home with a memory care unit. Dementia is a horrible, horrible thing.
That was really painful to watch, I wanted those people to help her. I’m so glad they put in the scenes at the end of her getting help.
This broke my heart. Both my grandmothers had dementia before death and I think the worst part was seeing them so afraid.
Is this an ad for why you should have kids?
It’s so hard for me to not blame people with mild mental illnesses for their behavior. Like cognitively I know they aren’t able to execute the same mental functions as the average person but emotionally what I see in front of me is someone acting in a disruptive manner. Fortunately, I’m not a total asshole so I keep all that to myself.
Man the exact same situation with the debit card happened to my grandpa who has dementia now. We would always go get out to eat but first stop at his bank to withdraw money. We did this 100s of times over the last 10 years & then one time he couldn’t figure out how to use the same machine he’s been using so I had to help him. Depressing stuff.
Literally no one does that, in Texas.
Take note Gen Z. That is POV.
I wish I had seen it coming earlier with my mum. She always told us not to worry about her.
Yet she was always on about her phone not working properly, or that she just couldn’t figure out why certain things in the house were having power issues. Or something as simple as changing stuff to the right channel on the tv. I live overseas, and she lived by herself and could up until a few years ago take good care of herself. She could also use a pc and a phone.
One day I had her on facetime and I noticed the ungodly amount of paperwork just thrown across the place, just everywhere. She told me a few people had visited her asking about money. When I called the week after her phone was dead, her mobile was cut off, I could not email her, or text. So I sent someone to go check on her. Well.. What they found was not pretty at all. She had basically resorted to living downstairs and sleeping on the couch, on all the papers she had gathered from stored away files to try and find out if she had paid her bills. She was certain she paid everything last Friday at the post-office. Unfortunately the last paid bill she paid was a gas bill and it was from six months ago. In her mind, she did it last Friday. Underneath those papers, were half eaten bananas, half eaten sandwiches, and other food from maybe weeks even months ago. Toilets were not flushed. The people that had been round were debt collectors. They literally did not give a fuck they had an old person with dementia in front of them, they were just there to collect. According to her she also let these people in her home as they seemed friendly. I am certain they would have gone through her stuff to find anything of value. She kept up an appearance that everything was fine. Maybe to her everything WAS fine. I think the only thing that didn’t get cut off was gas and electricity, but I am sure that would have been next. The campaign to get herself and her affairs back in order took almost a years worth of work. I later learned that when she did go outside she would end up in other peoples gardens, rather than where she was going. All those people only got annoyed and called the cops on her, who also never contacted us about what was happening. She would have been frightened and confused about all that.
Fast forward now a few years later, she has rapidly declined. She’s in a nursing home now.
It goes so bloody fast. She can still walk, she knows who we all are, she can recall certain things if it’s to do with the past and talk our ears off about it. Just every day things such as, who called, who visited, who’s voice is talking, what did I do this morning, what am I going to do today, why is there a vase there? etc. It sends her into so much confusion and panic.
The best thing is just to be positive with her, keep things extremely simple, don’t linger on long conversations for too long, and not treating her like an outcast of society. There will be moments of confusion and panic sure, but it helps in those situations to keep things moving and redirecting things to a positive place by being helpful and friendly. Sometimes it’s so hard to think and beat yourself up about ‘oh did I say that right’ or ‘I hope I didn’t do anything in a deceptive manner’ to add to the confusion. If your loved one is smiling, and not confused or panicking, then you did it right.
So whenever a crazy old lady asks for chicken cheese I have to stop what I’m doing and help them find it?
That sounds like a Hormel product that would come in a can.
I’ve been lucky so far with my grandparents. They’re both in their late 80s now and they’re definitely running at significantly reduced capacity, but still functional and can live by themselves (with daily visits and phone calls).
Nope. This doesn’t show the inability to process patterns or how disorienting repetitious spaces look. Like literally these are the known issues that dementia-friendly designs address.
Look at a series of ones: 111111111111111111111. Now try to count them quickly. That’s basically what the world looks like/feels like for someone with dementia. It’s your brain constantly drawing the wrong conclusions of your surroundings, meaning you’re in manual-mode for the most basic things. Really a missed opportunity to show visually what that feels like.
Help the aged. One time they were just like you.
I have a few times a year where I may try to put something that does not go in the fridge in the fridge……Oh no now I’m worried
The best piece of media I’ve ever seen that really shows how it might feel to have dementia was [The Father.](https://youtu.be/OFnoRaLAclg?si=M1xebR1Efgg_buBy)
I loved how the flat was changing so even we as an audience were never quite sure where he was or who was who. I really loved this film and recommend it!
I do the same thing when I go to the grocery store
This hits home so hard…it makes me feel so bad as this is a growing problem…the saddest thing is you see it every day, and you also see the impatience and intolerance of other people! No one cares, or helps anyone anymore!
The film *The Father*, starring Anthony Hopkins, made me feel what it’s like to have dementia. Very sad and unsettling.
Im 36
If you had shown me a smart phone 30 years ago I would have shit my pants.
My hope is that by time I am old we can just download into something. We maybe have a more natural cure. Maybe I get a cyborg brain or some tech augmentation that is at the stage of wide public use.
Least funny peep show episode
Although this video is specifically about dementia, it reminds me how utterly terrifying the prospect of growing old and living alone is.
Not everybody develops dementia, but we all grow old and our cognitive abilities decline over time. If we live long enough, we will eventually need assistance just to live. Think about all those nursing homes filled with people who spend the final years of their lives lonely and dependent. That’s the future for a lot of us, and it’s fucking scary.
I honestly don’t know why we don’t freak out more about growing old. Or maybe plenty of people do freak out about it, but we just don’t talk about it openly. Like nobody taught me how to accept and prepare for things like gradual cognitive and physical decline, or the eventual need for living assistance. I guess we’re all expected to just figure this shit out on our own.
Lost both grandmothers to dementia related complications within a week of one another last year. Truly an awful disease, seeing such proud caring women’s whole life being reduced to nothing slowly over the course of several years. Seeing someone that loved you unconditionally slowly forget who you even are. The worst was the few moments where they would have lucid moments and it was like nothing had changed only for it all to be ripped away and watching them die all over again.
Should be shown on TV everywhere. EVERYWHERE
I lost both grandfathers to this. I already decided that if the doc says I got it, I’m eating a bullet. I’m not going out that way. I saw a powerful man fall back to being a baby and the toll it took on my grandmother… I’m not doing that.
Someone with this kind of disability shouldn’t be living alone or going shopping alone anyway. She obviously can’t care for herself.
This reminds me of a time where something like this happened.
I work in a big office building downtown that has ~30 floors. Went on break with a friend when we when we arrived at our floor, i saw this older lady trying to swipe a card to access the doors for the floor (card kept getting denied) and we didn’t recognize her. My friend looked at me with a look of “who is that?”. I went up to her and asked if i could help her with the card. She then looked at me and said “Oh I’m just trying to get to my room”. I looked at her card and notice she was holding a hotel room keycard from the hotel just next door. I went “oh dear seems like we’re in the wrong location! let me help you get to your room” I asked her to hold on to my arm and down we went and walked to the next building. chatting about how she was from England and traveling with family etc. Anyway, we get to the hotel lobby and a younger women dashes towards us. she seemed to be a panicked state. anyway she runs over and explained they’ve been looking for her for some time and management was about to call the police. I explained she was just next door in the office building looking for her room and when i figured it out brought her here. You can’t imagine how releived they were.
Went back to the office and my buddy was like “how did you catch all of that, i was just gonna walk past her” I explained i had a grandfather die from Alzheimer and that i can read into these type of situations.