FORGET MEMORY BLOG

I remember sitting in a conference hotel (which hotel was that? which city?) and meeting (oh! I remember, it was Atlanta…) John Zeisel for the first time.  Meeting John is not something you forget (the city, now that’s a different matter).  John’s engine revvs at an unnaturally high level and doesn’t seem to stop.  At our first meeting in Atlanta, we both talked about writing books that had been forming in us for more than a decade and that seemed to be coming out of us in final draft form.  This was both a little scarey and exhilarating at the same time.

John and I share a world view on dementia and Alzheimer’s.  John is the president and co-founder of Hearthstone Alzheimer’s Care, Ltd.  His research into the impact of environmental design on the experience of dementia led him to advocate for a new way to think of “treatment” for Alzheimer’s.  We tend to think of treatment in the form of pills.  But Zeisel pushes us to consider the environment as part of the treatment plan.  How is the space designed?  How are people with dementia encouraged to use the space?  What kinds of programs/events enliven the space?

Zeisel also founded and co-directs Artists for Alzheimer’s, which seeks to bring the arts and artists into the lives of people with dementia.  Zeisel’s book, I’m Still Here: A breakthrough approach to understanding someone living with Alzheimer’s, has a section that explore various forms of the arts, including the TimeSlips project.  And in Forget Memory, I have a section that talks about Artists for Alzheimer’s.

I’m Still Here is clearly and accessibly written, and exudes Zeisel’s passion for changing the way we think about and treat people with dementia.  It works as a practical guide for families, for friends, and mainly I think for the people at the steering wheel of care systems and facilities, to better understand and care for people with dementia.

Some three years after meeting him for the first time, our books are meeting the marketplace at the same time, and I hope, acting as a one-two punch to jar the field into seeing people with dementia and the system in which we care for them, a little differently.

I'm Still Here