Part of the problem with dementia is that short term memory loss and aphasia are two of the most common early symptoms. It’s not because it’s a difficult word, it is because their brain no longer has the capacity to function that way. It wouldn’t matter what you called it, they still may not be able to learn it or remember it: the part of the brain that used to do that for them may no longer be accessible.

Most people don’t realise that dementia is terminal. It is a gradual cognitive and physical decline that results in death.

The Wicking Dementia Research and Education Centre at University of Tasmania has an open course on Understanding Dementia that is really good, and free, if anyone is interested in learning more.

I went under for an appendectomy in 2004. I can remember the feeling of the anaesthetic moving up my arm (they put it in through a wrist cannula). It was weird. It felt like nothing. My hand just disappeared from my senses. I felt it moving up my arm and into my shoulder and into my neck and

Unsolicited medical advice drives me nuts.

Gee. Thanks “doctor” for your advice. Obviously I’m going to listen to you after you watched a three minute YouTube video and not the doctor with six years of medical training and education!