Recommended by over 90% of subscribers
Recommended by over 90% of subscribers
This World Alzheimer’s Day, the theme is: ‘The earlier you know, the more you can do.’ It’s the idea we’re all striving for: understanding dementia clearly enough, early enough, to get the right support, and carrying that understanding forward to stay meaningfully connected at every stage of the condition.
Our Visiting With Purpose workshops sit inside exactly that thinking: helping families and carers recognise what dementia actually looks like, allowing people to see clearly enough to get the right help, and to keep showing up well for however long the journey lasts.
We sat down with our founder, John Ramsay, this World Alzheimer’s Day to talk about what that looks like in practice.
John’s father was diagnosed with dementia in the 1990s, and the diagnosis itself took years too long to arrive. “So many people equate dementia with an older person with memory issues,” he says. “But with my dad, we thought what we were seeing might be a midlife crisis, or overwork. Human brains are incredible … they go into survival mode.”
Without a diagnosis, families fill the gap with blame instead of understanding. “You start blaming them for mannerisms, for a lack of inhibition, even for aggression. But it’s not them, it’s the condition. It’s shocking and it’s hard. But unless you know that early, it’s very difficult to build a life of happiness. It becomes a life of tension and frustration instead.”
Knowing what to do with a diagnosis
Recognising the signs early is only half the story, and half of what Visiting With Purpose covers. The other half is what you do next, for years, as the condition changes, and that’s where John’s experience grounds him.
“When I see people connecting… when they get a smile, a laugh, some flicker of connection, that’s what hits me. Because for me, as a teenager, my visits to my dad felt boring. I didn’t want to go. And I now feel so guilty about that.
“I couldn’t make him smile. I wasn’t educated. I didn’t understand anything. We’d just shuffle around a garden and he wouldn’t know who I was.”
That’s the second part of Visiting With Purpose: not just to share the knowledge to help get the right diagnosis, but the tools to stay connected once you have one, the tools a teenage John didn’t have, and wishes he had.
A day in the life of the Happiness Programme
That same principle runs through the Happiness Programme itself. “Someone living with dementia is just the same person living with dementia,” John says. “They can have the same tastes, beliefs, likes and dislikes as they did before diagnosis.” The range reflects that: energising games to start the morning, food-themed activities before meals, sensory sessions for residents in bed, calming games in the evening, all built around the care home’s own calendar.
But the technology is only the entry point. “We’re providing interaction through light and sound- that’s our projector. But membership extends beyond the projector. We work with over 2,000 care homes, so we can see a huge range of care, collate the best of it, and train people not just to use our technology, but to engage with people and make them happier, full stop.”
Still learning, even now
John is candid that all this knowledge doesn’t make any of it easy. “It’s extremely frustrating when it’s someone you’re close with,” he admits. “When there’s history in a relationship, it’s harder to hold your breath, take a minute, and engage well. You’re never going to do it perfectly. But you can always do something to make life better, and that’s what matters.”
It’s the same message Visiting With Purpose exists to give every family: you won’t get it perfect. But knowing early, and knowing what to do with what you know, changes everything that comes after.
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