Page 32 - Changes and Challenges

Dementia
Changes and Challenges
• We may have impaired motivation. This may compound frustration
when we have a distorted sense of the passage of time. (I’ll get
around to explaining this tomorrow).

To give a real and personal example I sometimes encounter when cooking.
Occasionally I will get some of the preparatory tasks out of sequence and on
rare occasion have missed a key ingredient, such as the coffee in a cup of
coffee, or the yeast in bread. These are all ‘learning’ experiences, but the
biggest problem and source of frustration is timing, particularly when baking.
If I stay in close proximity to the oven and can watch it for the required time,
things turn out OK. However, if for example the bread requires 30 to 35
minutes to properly bake, I find that amount of time too long to do nothing as
it were. I will usually, go and do something more engaging such as check e-
mail and plan to return and check about 5 minutes before the required time.
Quite frequently I will become engaged in what I am doing and lose track of
time. This usually results in a rush/panic at the end and occasionally in a
‘burnt offering’. I find using timers etc to be of little value, because they
require me to be near them and/or give them my attention, which is more
boring/frustrating than just watching the oven in the first place.

My best solution to this problem is to have my partner check the ovens
progress near the appointed time and for her to remind me of its status.

Magnetoception.
Magnetoception is poorly developed in humans. Most people would have no
functional awareness of this sense. I have very good spatial awareness and
can generally locate myself very well in three-dimensional space. In the early
1980’s when I first travelled to the U.S.A. I realised I was having difficulty in
orientating myself. I was able to account for cultural differences, the language
differences and even the fact that they all drove on the wrong side of the
road. I soon found and adopted a simple solution. For example, if I was going
to go to the North, I would orient myself to what I believed north was, then go
O
in 180 – the opposite direction. This worked remarkable well.
More recently in Budapest I experienced the same issue but this time I had
Dementia. The sun and moon both appeared to rise in the wrong direction.

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