The Memory Cafe is coming to Revelstoke for the first time, creating a safe space for people with dementia and other cognitive disabilities to connect with family and friends while educating the community about these conditions.
Barb Stewart, program manager with the Medical Arts Health Research Penticton Group, said the event is a participatory action research pilot project and part of a UBC Okanagan study. This will be the first time the Memory Cafe appears in Revelstoke.
“It’s definitely a passion project for me … I’ve worked all my life in community and community program development,” she said.
She added that her team is experimenting with different ways to build more dementia-friendly communities using participatory action research methodology, a kind of research where the answers are found within the community.
This event hits home for Stewart, as her dad had a long journey with dementia and it was very difficult for not only him, but her mom experienced her own health challenges while caring for her husband.
“They became very isolated … and I just knew that we could do better and I knew answers were in the community” she said. Stewart’s father eventually went into care. “He became depressed and he lost the community that he had.”
She discovered that music helped improve her father’s experience with dementia.
“Music was seemed to be transcending all of the buildup of plaque in his brain,” she added. “I was curios about a lot of different things and so I’m just very grateful to be involved in this study. I do it in my dad’s honour.”
The Memory Cafe will be held at the Revelstoke Senior Centre on April 17 from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. The afternoon will include a complimentary lunch, reminiscent therapy, entertainment and education provided by the Stoke Youth Network.
The event will also feature a guest speaker. Christine Aiken, a Chilliwack resident, has been travelling with the Memory Cafe to share her experience with vascular dementia.
Aiken said she was diagnosed with young-onset dementia and noticed a lack of support and understanding from her peers.
“[I] was losing connections because of it,” she said. “A loss of career, a loss of friendships, a lot of losses.”
She added that finding people who shared the same experience as her sparked her passion for advocacy.
“If I just thought if I could just have one person, then my illness wouldn’t be for nothing and that started all these years of advocating.”
Aiken said her passion is rooted from the last of support, that she had to find her way back on her own.
“You can give into it or you can fight through it and it’s hard.”
She said she is excited about going to Revelstoke and speaking there, putting emphasis on the event’s impact on rural communities.
“When you go to these communities and you actually meet this people and they come to you afterwards and they hug you, and they thank you for making them feel like someone you understand … magic happens.”
The Revelstoke Memory Cafe will be approximately the 20th pilot project in rural communities in B.C. Similar projects have appeared in Summerland, Vernon, Osoyoos, Penticton and Princeton.
Stewart said Enderby and Sicamous are also on the list of Memory Cafe locations.
There is no registration required and the event is free to attend.
