Gerda Saunders's Blog: Field Notes on My Dementia

Featured image: Child Gerda—9 years old, Grade VI, in photo—imagines what she shall be when she grows up. Thanks to Peter for manipulating this photo and several illustrations (artists not known) as background to the photo, as well as creating the other manipulated images. “Que será, será  Whatever will be, will be The future’s not […]

The post Gerda re-cognizes her childhood “what shall I be’s” in light of Doña Quixote’s old age Que Será, Serás first appeared on MY LIFE WITH DEMENTIA.

Featured image: Detail of the Portrait of Macee Leodepard, Wife of The French Trader Jacques Coeur, by the French School (15th century). Jacques Coeur ( 1395-1456), a contemporary of Joan of Arc (1412-1431), was a significant patron of the arts, one of the wealthy merchants who helped shape the artistic landscape during the period when art […]

The post When Doña Quixote is more anguished about the holes in her HAIR than the holes in her HEAD… first appeared on MY LIFE WITH DEMENTIA.

Featured image: Danish artist Sophus Vermehren, Interior with Elderly Man Sleeping (1944). By the time of this painting, Vermehren was nearing the end of a long and successful career (1866-1950). He lived with his wife, Yelva Petrea Sophie Vermehren. Art critics believe that the elderly man on the left of the painting is a self-portrait […]

The post Blessed are the caregivers, for they make a heaven on earth for those they love: please Zoom with us to talk about “SPOUSAL CAREGIVING THROUGH DEMENTIA” first appeared on MY LIFE WITH DEMENTIA.

Featured image: Retablo, Oil on tin, 2007. In Mexico and other Spanish-speaking South American countries, a retablo is a devotional offering—using iconography from Catholicism—painted on a panel to hang in a church in fulfillment of a vow or in gratitude for divine intercession. The text on the image says, “My sentimental life was in chaos. I […]

The post Doña Quixote wants to commission a retablo: “with the sun in my face and the wind in my hair…” first appeared on MY LIFE WITH DEMENTIA.

Featured image: In the ruins of Pompeii, archeologists discovered a loaf of bread baked just before the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 AD and carbonized  during the eruption by the pyroclastic flow. Chemical analysis shows that it was a type of sourdough.The loaf was incised before being baked by dividing it into wedges to […]

The post “Give me this day my daily…” first appeared on MY LIFE WITH DEMENTIA.

Featured image: The Salt Lake City Women’s Shelter has supported unhoused women and their children since 1972. (Photo from their web page.) My now 14-year-old granddaughter Aliya and her same-age friends Anna and Ellie volunteered for a community service project at their school, Salt Lake Arts Academy. Their goal is to collect clothes for Salt […]

The post My Gen Z granddaughter Aliya and friends Anna & Ellie are collecting clothes for the Salt Lake City Women’s Shelter first appeared on MY LIFE WITH DEMENTIA.

Featured image: Wendy Mitchell (then 63) skydiving. Daily Mail. Wendy Mitchell was a force of nature. She was my role model of how to live fully and with joy even when dementia hamstrings your every action every day. After her death on Feb 22nd 2024 from voluntarily stopping eating and drinking (VSED), Wendy’s daughters Sarah […]

The post In memoriam: Wendy Mitchell, my fellow dementer and zoom-panel buddy, died on Feb 22nd after voluntarily stopping eating and drinking (VSED) first appeared on MY LIFE WITH DEMENTIA.

Featured Image: Baku, by one of Japan’s most famous manga artists, Shigeru Mizuki, best known for drawing yokai, namely ghosts and monsters. As the New Yorker puts it, he “resurrected Japan’s folk creatures as pop culture for the masses. He was “a member of the Japanese Society of Cultural Anthropology, and traveled to more than […]

The post Who tells ego-boosting lies in a dream and knows in their dream they’re lying? That would be Doña Quixote first appeared on MY LIFE WITH DEMENTIA.

The post Who tells ego-boosting lies in a dream and knows in their dream they’re lying? That would be Doña Quixote appeared first on MY LIFE WITH DEMENTIA.

Featured image, adapted by Peter from two Escher artworks: 1), Relativity (1953), M. C. Escher’s classic lithograph that presents the visual imagery of a world where the laws of gravity have ceased to exist. 2), Hen with Egg, M.C. Escher (1917) So far in 2024, Doña Quixote has lost two major material things: 1), her […]

The post Can Doña Quixote still cross the road? Only when Peter helps her plot an exit from the Escher stairs in her head first appeared on MY LIFE WITH DEMENTIA.

The post Can Doña Quixote still cross the road? Only when Peter helps her plot an exit from the Escher stairs in her head appeared first on MY LIFE WITH DEMENTIA.

Featured image: Adoration of the Magi by  Giotto di Bondone (1267–1337). The Star of Bethlehem is shown as a comet above the christ child. Giotto witnessed an appearance of Halley’s Comet in 1301. Halley is visible from Earth every 74.7 years, or, more simply, every 75-79 years. Halley would orbit another 9 times—between Earth and […]

The post A snowball’s chance in hell? or How a (19-year-old) old soul “plays with and is fed by” a horrific accident first appeared on MY LIFE WITH DEMENTIA.

The post A snowball’s chance in hell? or How a (19-year-old) old soul “plays with and is fed by” a horrific accident appeared first on MY LIFE WITH DEMENTIA.