WELCOME TO MY BLOG

In my last post, I talked about Imposter Syndrome, the guilt of feeling like a fraud, even when we can sometimes function "normally." Today, I want to tackle the other side of that coin: how to explain this phenomenon to the people around us. We call it Showtiming . It’s the reason why I can chat happily at a family barbecue on Sunday afternoon, but can’t work out how to use my coffee machine on Monday morning. It is confusing for us, but it is often baffling for our friends

I remember the day I got my diagnosis vividly. I sat in the neurologist's office, clutching my partner’s hand, listening to words that felt too big and too heavy for a person my age... Young-Onset Dementia. But then, I walked out to the car. I unlocked the door. I drove home. I made dinner. And a quiet, insidious thought crept in: Are they sure? I don’t feel like I have dementia. Maybe I’m making this up. We talk a lot about the grief and the confusion of this disease, but we

ve always had a well-developed sense of humour. It’s kept me from falling into the depths of despair on many occasions and helped me to avoid some potentially dangerous situations. But most of all, I love to laugh and be in the company of others who are creating and enjoying humour. As someone living with dementia, I often find that people expect my world to be defined by loss or confusion. However, my work co-presenting a workshop on the therapeutic benefits of clowning a fe

Happy New Year! The festive bustle has ended. The grandchildren have returned home, the wrapping paper is gone, and the house is peaceful again. In January’s quiet, I find myself, as always, checking my instruments, reviewing last year’s flight log, and plotting the course ahead. It has been nearly seven years since my diagnosis. Seven years. If you had told me back then that I would still be here, writing to you, embracing new technology, and travelling to conferences, I mi

The house is finally quiet. The festive "operations" have ceased, the grandchildren have returned to their own billets, and the wrapping paper has been cleared away. Once, the noise brought comfort, echoing the roar of jet engines and the ordered chaos of an RAF flight line or busy engineering hangar. But now, as the present silence settles heavily, I become aware of how much I’ve changed. My navigation systems aren't what they used to be—and I feel it most when excitement sh

Hello again, friends. I’ve been meaning pen a blog on inclusivity and exclusion for a while now, but I’ve been spurred into action after reading a wonderful piece by Dr. Shibley Rahman (a great champion in the world of dementia, and a man that I respect and admire) on LinkedIn this morning. So here is a sort of dual blog, where I’ll try to address the general topic of inclusion/exclusion in society and, as an added bonus, what inclusion/exclusion means to me on a personal lev