Living with dementia isn’t easy. This neurodegenerative disorder poses numerous challenges to a person’s day-to-day routine and can impact every aspect of their life.
Dementia can affect your loved one’s cognitive functions, memory, and behavior—there’s very little that isn’t impacted in some way by dementia.
Understanding the challenges a loved one with dementia faces daily can give you a unique insight into how to provide them with the care they need. Often, it helps to seek the help of a trained team of professionals, like that offered by a memory care community.
So what are the daily challenges seniors with dementia face?
Memory Loss
Memory loss may be the trademark symptom of dementia. When suffering from memory impairment, seniors often suffer from short-term memory loss. This can make it challenging to remember recent events, the names of the people around them, or their everyday tasks.
This constant struggle with memory loss can lead to confusion and frustration, leading to roadblocks in completing their daily activities. Cooking, taking their medication, or recognizing their loved ones’ faces can become increasingly challenging as memory impairment progresses.
Social Isolation
As we age, developing feelings of social isolation and loneliness is extremely common. With the constant changes to our daily routines, it becomes more challenging to keep in touch with those around us or meet new people. This is made much more difficult when conditions like Alzheimer’s disease and other types of dementia come into play.
This neurodegenerative disorder can cause communication problems, making engaging in conversation and bonding with the people around you difficult. As time passes, this can lead to withdrawal from social activities and reduced time spent with family and friends.
Social isolation can be extremely damaging to both a person’s mental health and cognitive function, making it important to take the time to engage in conversation and encourage social connection with a loved one struggling with memory impairment.
Loss of Independence
Dementia can gradually erode a person’s ability to maintain their independence. Simple things like deciding what to wear, what to cook for dinner, or even managing finances can become almost impossible. Seniors with dementia often need to rely on others for support and supervision, and as the condition progresses, these needs may begin increasing.
This loss of independence can be emotionally challenging as your loved one begins to feel a loss of control or their sense of self-identity diminishes. It can help to encourage them to continue doing what they can to feel like themselves, even by promoting their hobbies or helping with daily tasks.
Decision-Making
Dementia impairs a person’s ability to make sound judgments and decisions. They may decide not to take their medication or make decisions that can seem confusing to others. This can often challenge their autonomy as they begin requiring assistance from their caregivers to support their safety and well-being.
When needing others to make simple decisions, like what clothes you’ll wear or what you’ll eat for dinner, it can often feel like you’re losing control over your life. It becomes crucial to take time to provide them with guidance and support, allowing them to make decisions—as long as your loved one can still be safe and happy—so they can retain autonomy when possible.
Safety Problems
Safety becomes a significant concern when memory impairment comes into play. Conditions like dementia can affect your loved one’s ability to recognize environmental hazards or remember essential safety measures.
Things like turning off the stove, using oven mitts, or avoiding dangerous objects become much riskier. Dementia can affect their ability to use proper safety measures or even cause them to wander away from familiar environments, making daily life much more dangerous.
It’s important to utilize safety measures, like ensuring a safe home environment, using monitoring devices, and providing supervision when possible. This allows you to promote your loved one’s well-being, health, and safety.
Communication Problems
Dementia can impact a person’s ability to communicate effectively. Finding the right words, following a conversation, expressing themselves, or even remembering what’s being talked about can be a struggle. They may have trouble understanding others, causing frustration in social interactions.
This can cause social withdrawal, as communication may sometimes become too difficult and frustrating. It’s essential to prioritize patience, active listening, and using any communication techniques to continue encouraging social connection for your loved one.
Personal Care
One of the biggest challenges caused by dementia is how it affects a person’s ability to care for themselves. Seniors living with dementia may have difficulty remembering to bathe, change clothes, brush their teeth, or cook, making it much more challenging to take care of themselves.
Dementia can affect a person’s ability to recognize how important personal care is, leading to partial or total neglect of these essential tasks. Caregivers need to provide support where possible for personal care activities so seniors can maintain their hygiene and well-being.
How to Help a Loved One with Dementia
Supporting a loved one with dementia requires a great deal of understanding and specialized care. Sometimes, it’s challenging to provide this support on your own. This is when communities like Bellaire at Stone Port become an excellent option. Our memory care community prioritizes quality of life for every one of our residents, and our team is trained to provide a high level of care.
It’s okay to ask for help—to get your loved one the care they deserve, schedule a tour with us today.