There are seasons in life – each with their joys and pains. There are times of freedom and choice, and times when we are constrained by our responsibilities – whether that is work, children, church ministry or relationships. But a new season of testing has become a much bigger reality for people in their 50s and 60s: the season of caring for dementia sufferers. Why is this?
As we live longer – and the physical illnesses of congestive heart disease and cancer that limited our parents to the “threescore years and ten” have receded – there is an increased likelihood that we will find ourselves caring for parents, relatives and partners who are one of the growing numbers with some kind of dementia.
Academic studies suggest that there are currently almost a million people in the UK living with dementia of some kind. Alzheimer’s accounts for over 60 percent of these precious souls, with Vascular dementia the next most common type followed by dementia with Lewy Bodies and Frontotemporal dementia.
