Dementia Action Week

litadoolan

May 21—2026

What does it mean to remember someone?

There is a moment that happens quietly in dementia care.
Not in the scan. Not in the diagnosis.
But in the pause before someone enters a room and remembers how a person likes their tea.
Or the way a daughter still smooths her mother’s cardigan sleeve before visitors arrive.
Or someone sitting in a hospital corridor drawing, because words feel too sharp that day.

Dementia Action Week — running 18–24 May — asks us to think not only about memory, but about recognition. About what it means to remain connected to one another when certainty becomes fragile.

Below are a few things available this week if you’d like to learn, create, reflect or simply feel less alone in the conversation.

1. Become a Dementia Friend — online video (anytime) Whether you attend a face-to-face or virtual Dementia Friends session or watch the short online video, Dementia Friends is about learning more about dementia and the small ways you can help. The online video route takes about 20 minutes and you can do it immediately at dementiafriends.org.uk. If you can’t find a session to attend, you can become a Dementia Friend by watching the video or requesting your own session.

2. Share your Forget Me Not story — Alzheimer’s Society story wall (online) The Alzheimer’s Society is asking people to tell them why they wear their Forget Me Not and they will share it on their story wall. This is entirely online at alzheimers.org.uk and is one of the central campaign activities this week.

3. Alzheimer’s Association free live webinar — 21 May (online) On 21 May 2026, 1–2pm CT, there is a free live webinar on how to communicate effectively with people living with dementia as the condition progresses, covering person-centred approaches. This is US-based (Alzheimer’s Association) but free and open to anyone at alz.org/live-learning-webinars

4. Join Dementia UK’s campaign network — online Dementia UK is asking people to join their campaign network to push for urgent improvements in dementia care and make sure every family gets the support they need. You sign up online and become part of a movement demanding better dementia care at dementiauk.org/dementia-action-week

5. Admiral Nurse Helpline — phone and online, ongoing Dementia UK’s free, confidential helpline is staffed by specialist Admiral Nurses — the only dementia helpline in the UK staffed by specialist dementia nurses. Not an event as such, but genuinely available online this week to anyone who needs support or has questions.

6.Listen The Shape of Things Undone — Brighton Fringe 2026

This 33-minute audio monologue, written by Lita Doolan and performed by Julie Broadbent, follows Christine, a care worker on the final shift of a hospital ward quietly being decommissioned. The piece explores dementia, care and personhood through memory, institutional change and the small dignities that can disappear when systems move too quickly.

★★★★½ Breaking The Fourth Wall
★★★★ BroadwayWorld

Available free online throughout May via Brighton Fringe.

Sometimes theatre cannot solve anything.
But it can sit beside uncertainty for a while.

Draw

Mindful Drawing & Creative Reflection

Many museums, dementia charities and arts organisations now run gentle creative sessions designed around memory, observation and calm attention rather than “being good at art.”

You might look for:

mindful drawing classes at local galleries
community sketchbook groups
“drawing for wellbeing” workshops
nature journalling sessions
online slow art classes

The point is not performance.
It is noticing.

The Alzheimer’s Society also has resources exploring creativity and dementia-friendly arts activities for carers and families.

Listen & Learn

Podcasts on dementia, care and memory

A few thoughtful places to begin:

The Dementia Podcast (Alzheimer’s Society)
Conversations with carers, clinicians and people living with dementia.
BBC Inside Health
Often covers ageing, memory and neurological research in accessible ways.
Being Patient Podcast
Focused on dementia science, lived experience and emerging research.

Podcasts can sometimes reach places that leaflets cannot.
You can walk with them. Cook with them. Sit quietly beside them.

Not every meaningful act has to become an initiative.

A phone call.
A cup of tea.
Sending a poem.
Sitting beside someone without correcting them.
Remembering that carers are often carrying invisible exhaustion.

These things matter too.

This week, maybe the important thing is not only asking:

“How do we cure memory loss?”

but also:

“How do we help people feel recognised while they are still here?”