Still Here: Holding On and Letting Go in the Landscape of Dementia

Making Peace with Change
Written By Kami Norland

This essay follows one couple’s journey through dementia—not just the practical challenges, but the deeper work of staying present, grieving change, and rediscovering connection in unexpected places.

If you’ve ever walked alongside someone with dementia, you may recognize parts of this story.

Recently, a friend reached out. She was looking for a geriatric psychiatrist to adjust her husband’s medications. But as we talked, it became clear that the real story wasn’t just about finding the right pill. It was about two people—Marcus and Anna—navigating something no medication can fully touch: the slow, disorienting unraveling of a life they built together.

They bring so much strength to this journey. Marcus has lived in the same mid-sized community for decades. He has friends, history, and a sense of place. Anna has weathered many storms with grace. And yet, despite all that, they’re both feeling worn out and isolated.

Marcus now spends his nights pacing the house, rereading plaques and papers, immersed in fragments of memory. He doesn’t wander far, but he wanders often. Anna, exhausted, sleeps only a few hours a night. She is fiercely engaged, deeply informed—and deeply tired.

If you’ve ever Googled “how to help someone with dementia,” you know what you’ll find: a checklist of medications, behavioral tips, communication strategies, support services. These are useful, necessary, and often lifesaving.

But if you’re looking for help coping with the grief of watching someone slip away, or the loss of a shared future, or the daily act of making peace with change—you’ll have to dig deeper. And yet, this is the heart of the experience. Dementia, by its nature, is a condition defined by ongoing loss. Not just memory loss, but emotional, social, and spiritual loss—for both the person with dementia and those who love them.

For the person with dementia, emotional experience often remains intact even as language and logic fade. Imagine having intense feelings—fear, sadness, frustration—but losing the words to explain them. Maybe it’s like being stuck in a dream you can’t describe or escape. And for caregivers, there’s a different kind of language breakdown: the words and routines that once defined a relationship begin to dissolve, replaced by improvisation, repetition, and silence.

“And for caregivers, there’s a different kind of language breakdown: the words and routines that once defined a relationship begin to dissolve, replaced by improvisation, repetition, and silence.”
— JGP

This is where “to-do lists” fall short. You can’t fix grief with a whiteboard. You can’t task-manage your way through loss. What’s needed is presence. Validation. The willingness to sit with pain without trying to erase it. These are soft skills—emotional skills—that don’t always get the attention they deserve in our healthcare system or our culture.

But they matter. They are part of healing. And they have real, physiological consequences. Chronic grief activates stress responses in the body—hormones, inflammation, immune suppression. When we suppress or ignore our emotions, these responses may linger and deepen. But when we acknowledge them, when we listen to our bodies and allow for emotional truth, something shifts. Our nervous system settles. Healing becomes possible—not as a cure, but as a kind of peace.

In Anna’s case, I can already sense this shift. There’s more storytelling. More humor. More acceptance that she doesn’t have to fix everything. Sometimes, she’s even learning to rest while Marcus walks. This isn’t giving up. It’s adapting. It’s honoring the reality of change without giving in to despair.

And surprisingly, there is reason for hope beyond the individual. Despite headlines about a “tsunami of dementia,” recent studies show that the incidence of dementia—how many people develop it per capita—is actually declining.

Why? Not because of breakthrough drugs. The most likely reasons are reduced smoking and higher levels of education, both of which play a role in brain health. These are things we’ve improved through public health efforts and personal choices—and they give us reason to believe that more progress is possible. Imagine what we can do as we continue to foster social connection, support heart health, stay active, and nourish both body and mind.

So yes, there is work to do. But there is also story, meaning, connection—and hope.

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Kami Norland
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