dementia – FIT IS A FEMINIST ISSUE

I recently came across this article comparing the dementia risks for people using different forms of active and passive transit. Cyclists came out on top, with significantly lower rates of various forms of dementia.

“Previous studies have found a link between spatial navigational abilities and brain volume, which fits in with what the researchers found here: that cyclists ended up with higher hippocampal volumes.

“It could be the level of physical activity cycling demands that is largely responsible lowering the dementia risk, or having to negotiate routes and directions, or the need to stay alert, or perhaps being more exposed to fresh air.”

The study was careful to note that it was a link, but not necessarily a causal relationship. That makes me happy; I’m always suspicious of studies that aren’t clear about what they don’t know or didn’t examine.

I have written about the positive impacts of dance in fighting off dementia before, and more recent research backs it up. The London Taxi Driver Study researched a much more sedentary population, but one that relies on negotiating routes and directions, and where significantly larger hippocampus was found in study participants.

I’m happy to have another incentive to ride my bike.

Whee! A woman wearing an orange vest and raincoat rides a green bicycle. she has a big smile and one arm is up, as in celebration.

My gran has been in care since 2021. Before that there were signs that she had some memory problems. Her personality changed as she forgot to be reserved. She was more joyful and spontaneous as well as flustered. She couldn’t make it to a specific place at a specific time.

She did not willingly go into care and was very angry at my aunt and uncle who took her.

I got to visit her on her birthday in 2021 and she forgot that she was opening her present while taking the tissue paper out of the bag.

Her confusion quickly passed and she was back, in the moment, her personality shining.

I’ve visited each time I’m in New Brunswick. This summer our visit was challenging I think for both of us. She couldn’t form a sentence. There were moments she was so deep in her mind I didn’t recognize her face. And then she would be back. Her sharp wit and quick smile. Gran has the driest sense of humour. We laughed so hard.

She has forgotten so many things. The one thing she hasn’t forgotten is that she wants to go home. Not the house she raised her children in, but her childhood home.

It was where I stayed in 2021.

My great grandparents house is a story and a half covered in cedar shingles.

“Do I know you from Lake Ave?” She is looking for connection and context.

“Yes, I visited you, your sister and your parents quite a bit.”

After this year’s visit my sister and I went through boxes of her things that were gifted to us.

It was an assortment of mismatched dishes, linens and knickknacks.

When I got home I decided I was decorating in defiance of Gran’s dementia.

Five plates of nursery rhyme characters? Front and center in my dining room.

Irish linens still in the box? Heck ya, we sleep on pillowcases the envy of royalty.

Handkerchiefs, napkins, crystal. It’s all being used. I remember the times we used these in Gran’s home. I remember the care she took to keep a house so clean you could eat off the floor. I remember. And these mementos remind me that we all will forget at some point.