Alzheimer's Society Dementia Advert

I looked after my mum when she had dementia. The day came when I had tears dripping off my chin and my husband said ‘it’s her or me’. I knew a hairdresser who went round homes and she recommended a good one where my mum was well looked after.
My mum always recognized me and she knew that one of my daughters had a baby. She didn’t know which one but she was sure that my (second) husband was the father!
Luckily I had power of attorney so was able to sell her house to pay the fees. The annoying thing was that she paid more than the council paid for the ladies who didn’t have to pay so we were subsidizing them.
Sad to say, like some of the others, I was relieved when she died.

I found myself thinking that it was the whole point of the advert. Dementia is dehumanising.

So true.
I thought it was a good hard-hitting advert and well made.

I hope it encourages people to support dementia charities and understand more about this terrible condition.

The advert was co-produced with dementia sufferers. Don't deny them their voice

As I said in my post - the petition to have it removed was started by a person living with dementia.

People living with dementia are not, nowadays, described as suffering from dementia - the term is living with.

kittylester

I think it is an appalling advert! I have signed the Petition against it- which was started by a woman living with dementia.

There is such a lot of life to be had even after diagnosis.

How dradful to be newly diagnosed with any sort of dementia and then seeing that advert.

I volunteer with lots of people living with dementia, and their carers, and think this is a really scary portrayal of the future.

Sorry, but when I was in the thick of it, I used to get very irritated to see articles or posters trying to put a cosy, ‘friendly’ gloss on it. E.g. ‘It’s possible to live well with dementia!’

Well, it possibly may be for some of those who suffer from it, but it’s almost always very hard for their families. And if sufferers are anything like my mother, so often worried, anxious or frightened of things she couldn’t even name, or else in a terrible state because of some awful dream she was utterly convinced was real…

Or else like the poor lady (in her 80s) at my mother’s care home, often so distraught and crying bitterly because her mother wouldn’t know where she was…

Yes, there was also the old lady who would happily tell you almost every time that her mum and dad and gran and grandad were coming soon, and they were all going to the seaside together!

Bless her, she was happy back in her sunlit childhood idyll, but the previous sort of scenarios are in my experience (my Dm had it for 15 years and I was visiting her care home for the last 8) are considerably more common.

OldFrill

kittylester

I think it is an appalling advert! I have signed the Petition against it- which was started by a woman living with dementia.

There is such a lot of life to be had even after diagnosis.

How dradful to be newly diagnosed with any sort of dementia and then seeing that advert.

I volunteer with lots of people living with dementia, and their carers, and think this is a really scary portrayal of the future.

The advert was co-produced with dementia sufferers. Don't deny them their voice

Well said!

kittylester

^The advert was co-produced with dementia sufferers. Don't deny them their voice^

As I said in my post - the petition to have it removed was started by a person living with dementia.

People living with dementia are not, nowadays, described as suffering from dementia - the term is living with.

I can assure you that both my mother and mother-in-law suffered with their dementia. What they went through, I would not wish on anyone. Suffering it most certainly was.

People with dementia are most certainly not “living with it”.

They are suffering distressed frustrated angry scared and most of all left to it themselves with their family if they are lucky

It’s an illness than should not be “downgraded” in any way you can’t whitewash the suffering…

It’s cruel from beginning to the end.

The advert is very realistic and those who have fared for loved ones with the condition know it is true to life, even if your loved one wasn't quite as ill as that. If you haven't had any day to day dealings with a person who has advanced dementia, honestly you would not know, in the beginning they can be very good at hiding it. Some people seem to think it is just about their memory.
"Until they have walked a mile in the shoes of someone who has cared for a dementia patient " how would they?

I have work volunteering for the Alzheimer's Society - for many years. I think the video is spot on !! So often Dementia is portrayed in a very positive way , that is all well and good to a certain extent. However the reality is devastating for the person diognosed with dementia and importantly those who are in a caring role. My mother was never diognosed but most definitely had dementia in her final years - my dear husband has recently been diognosed and I fear for our future. Depressing as the video is it does not make me feel upset , angry or depressed - as I already know the reality of dementia. No advert / video can possibly make me feel any worse! It's a scary picture of what is to come but it is reality and
I am only already too aware of that. In the meantime we love and live as well as possible, enjoy the positives and while I know what is in the bag I don't dwell on it . My DH is taking medication and is convinced this will be very beneficial - he is not as clued up as me on Alzheimer's Disease and I am grateful for that. I recognize the video may be very traumatic for some people but for me it does not teach me anything I don't know! My opinion is from a carers point of view I do think it would be traumatic for my DH to see this video - I will most certainly ensure he does not see it! So I have mixed views about it .

It's much the same as the Macmillan ads, I suppose.

They are fairly hard hitting.

Yes Miss A but MacMillan ads are accepted as portraying the very cruel illness cancer is and accepted by the public
.

Alzhimers ads don’t get the same respect. But this one might. Hard though it to watch it’s realistic.

I lost family to cancer so I know the pain and suffering involved.

I also know the support given to the patient and the family through MacMillan or Marie Currie Differs very much from the Alzhimers patient.

Simply because the boots on the ground don’t exist.

At one time people wouldn't even say the word "cancer"

I hope the alzheimer's ad helps bring it out into the open, if it continues to be shown, that is.

We can only hope and pray that some good comes from it,
Good to see you back Miss A.💐

Oh, thank you.

I'm sorry, Kittylester, but there comes a point in most dementia patients' lives when they certainly aren't living, they are surviving. Anybody with a progressive, degenerative illness knows that they are likely to be facing a horrible future but with funding for research, there could be a breakthrough which will help delay or turn back that projection for the future.
Without the considerable research funds for cancer, many people wouldn't have hope for remission like they do today. Similarly with Multiple Sclerosis where the outlook was very bleak; research has provided more treatments to help keep people active.

That does not mean it is right to scare the living daylights out of the recently diagnosesd and their carers.

Well I can assure those people that my lovely mother and my lovely Father were suffering from dementia, not living with it As were all of us, their family, and their friends.

kittylester

That does not mean it is right to scare the living daylights out of the recently diagnosesd and their carers.

It's an absolutely terrifying disease, denying that serves no purpose. Both sufferers (l make no apology for the use of that term despite your patronising protestation) and carers should be aware of what they have to deal with. It doesn't get better, just far, far worse. Prettying it up is denial, pointless.

kittylester

^The advert was co-produced with dementia sufferers. Don't deny them their voice^

As I said in my post - the petition to have it removed was started by a person living with dementia.

People living with dementia are not, nowadays, described as suffering from dementia - the term is living with.

I can only find one petition online. There is no suggestion that the person who started it is living with has dementia.

I’ve just watched the ad and think that the title, The Long Goodbye, is very apt. I’ve been a ‘dementia friend’ for about ten years now and have attended conferences, seminars and training days where carers and people with dementia have expressed the wish that more people understood the reality of the illness. With a beloved relative currently in the grip of this disease I’m happy for there to be as much publicity as possible if it increases knowledge and generates additional funds.

And terrifying for those newly diagnosed and for their carers.

I help run Carer Learning courses for people caring for those recently diagnosed with a dementia, for those who are newly post diagnosis, those waiting for diagnosis and for those who have been diagnosed with Mild Cognitive Impairment - which has a very high incidence of developing into dementia.

How awful must they feel having that thrust at them.

'Living with dementia' is the preferred term nowadays rather than 'sufferer'.

I appreciate what you're saying, kittylester, but at the end of the day, dementia is terrifying and there's no point in trying to sugar coat that. It's clear from this thread that many of us have had first hand experience of caring for a loved one with dementia and seeing them actually suffer from it - especially in the later stages.

I am very cross about this advert. My Father has dementia and my Mum has to distract my Dad when it comes on. Did they not think about the effect it would have on those with this disease? Cruel and heartless, to say the least!

I, too, have experience of a mother with Alzheimer's disease. And, I still say that this ad is step too far.

After we’d had FiL (with dementia) living with us for over a year, it became unsustainable (up and down, banging and shouting at night, violent rages, etc.) we found a very nice care home for him.

His younger sister, who lived in a seaside town with lots of retirees and care homes, while berating us soundly (particularly me, who was doing 99% of it) for not wanting to keep him at home) insisted on a care home near her. And as it happened, the best home we found was a very short walk from her flat.

Within just a few weeks of him moving, I would have her on the phone wailing that he was coming round every afternoon and she couldn’t cope! ‘He paces constantly up and down! He won’t let me watch Countdown!’

‘So perhaps you now have some very small idea of what it was like for me, all day and all night!’ said I.

She did very grudgingly admit that she’d been wrong to accuse us (particularly me) of being selfish and uncaring.

So TBH if a hard-hitting ad gives people like her a better idea of the realities, I’m all for it. Because so many people who have eventually gone down the care home route with a relative (usually after much heart-searching) have been accused by people who haven’t a clue, of being selfish and uncaring.

I used to think that if I heard one more time the pious comment that ‘in other countries people look after their own’ I would honestly do the person a mischief.