Feelings If ever a word engendered a host of negative emotional reactions, it is dementia. Despair, grief, loss, guilt, depression, sadness, bewilderment, anger, resentment, shock… the list goes on. All these reactions are normal responses, and at various times are felt by both the person with dementia as well as the carer.

A common misperception is that because dementia represents 'forgetfulness' and 'memory loss', a person with the disease forgets or loses feelings and emotions as well. If this were so, a person with dementia would display no adverse behaviours and would quietly fade into a vegetative state. Yet even in the last phases of the disease, the person with dementia will respond to a gentle touch, soft music, or soothing words. Theirs is a special kind of loss, a lost ability to express emotions, it is not a loss of ability to feel emotions.