Inclusion and dementia

I was invited to a talk hosted by a friend with YOD or young onset dementia. She and a few others shared about their experiences, stereotype and the stigma of the label of dementia or of their parents they were caring for. Stereotypes e.g people with dementia can be violent only increases the stigma. Stigma then makes people less open to sharing and getting help or going out for fear of being judged. This isolation further accelerates the deterioration of cognitive abilities. Overall it impacts the person and their families negatively. Even with those who are diagnosed, caregiver support can still be challenging.

There are similarities and differences with people with disabilities or special educational needs in the aspect of stereotypes and stigma. While there is more awareness of disabilities, dementia is an area less understood. People with YOD also lose their cognitive abilities gradually and this can become an invisible disability.

A similar need remains to raise more awareness and education about dementia. People with YOD or dementia is a marginalised group in some sense.

More than that, we identified that at the end of the day, inclusion is the same direction that we are moving towards. Inclusion happens when there is connectedness and the adoption of a strength-based perspective.

Connectedness is really about building bridges to understand other people. This requires curiosity and compassion before making sweeping judgments. Learning to ask questions about why people are behaving in a certain way could open the way for us to empathize and sympathize; also to understand the gaps that need to be plugged so that appropriate supports could be identified and implemented.

The strength-based perspective as mentioned in other posts remains critical. Inclusion brings together the diversity of strengths while connectedness allows us to harness the variety of strengths into a collective narrative so that together we are stronger and better.

I think this is the essence of inclusion where we recognise and value the dignity of every person as well as their participation as contributing members of society.