FOR a long time, I thought dementia had ruined my life.

“It has stolen her life, and I think it’s stolen mine,” I told myself in darker moments. Anyone who has cared for a loved one with dementia may have occasionally thought the same.

My mother was struck down with what we now call early onset dementia when she was barely in her mid-fifties. If there is any great divine force out there it seemed absurd to me that they should choose my happy mum - a woman who embraced life and had a go at pretty much anything - to be cursed with a particularly cruel disease that gnawed at her for over a decade, leaving her unable to see, walk, speak or even think for herself.

I spent years helping to care for my mum, and I grew to hate dementia. When she started falling over and I struggled to get her back on her feet, I hated dementia. The first time I realised she didn’t recognise me, I hated dementia. When she wailed and screamed, digging her nails into her skin in fright and frustration because something terrible was happening to her, I hated dementia.

When I watched my kind, patient dad brush the hair of the woman he’d shared his life with, speaking softly to her like she was a child, I hated dementia. When I fed her, and got impatient and snappy when she refused to open her mouth, I hated dementia.

I watched her fade away. Sometimes I could barely remember the vibrant, funny, whirlwind of a woman who taught generations of Bradford schoolchildren and joined a bewildering array of societies and classes, somehow finding time to be our fabulous mother as well.

I resented friends with healthy mothers. They took theirs out for lunch, while mine couldn’t cut her own fingernails. I longed to chat to Mum on the ‘phone. Instead came a lingering sense of bereavement as she turned into a shell - in her final years bedridden, pale, frail and twitching, like a tiny bird curled up in her surgical bed. Dementia stole her memories, her dignity, ability and ultimately her life, and it turned a light off in mine.

So why do I now find myself an enthusiastic advocate of something called ‘Dementia Friends’?

As a feature writer, I have in recent years encountered individuals and organisations making a difference for people with dementia, helping them live well. People like Bev Fletcher, co-ordinator of Bradford District Dementia Action Alliance, which helps organisations and businesses to be Dementia Friendly by meeting needs of people with dementia. People like Bob Hutton, who runs the Memory Tree, a reminiscence group for people with dementia. I attended a session last week and found laughter, song, support and companionship. The men and women I met were living well, and that was uplifting. And people who, like me, turned out for this summer’s Bradford Memory Walk, each with someone’s name pinned to our backs.

This week we learned that dementia has become a leading cause of death in England and Wales for the first time. The Office for National Statistics revealed figures have more than doubled over the last five years.

There are hundreds of Dementia Friends and Champions across our district, from corner shops to dentists and firefighters.

With a rapidly expanding ageing population, dementia is one of the most pressing issues of our time. Anyone who thinks it won't affect them at some point, has their head in the sand. We need to face up to it and make our society one in which people affected by this condition - and their carers - can live well.

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