How To Care For Someone With Dementia: Begin Again Moments

Begin Again with Davina McCall

FlightStory

Mental Health, Education, Society & Culture, Self-improvement, Health & Fitness

4.6 • 971 Ratings

🗓️ 22 February 2026

⏱️ 18 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

What does it really feel like to lose someone… while they’re still here? In this powerful Begin Again Moments, Jamie Theakston opens up about his father’s dementia, the quiet grief, the role reversal, and the heartbreak of watching a parent slowly change. He speaks candidly about the anxiety of caring for someone who wants to stay independent, and the complicated emotions that come with loving someone who is still physically present but gradually slipping away . Then psychologist Kimberley Wilson explains the science behind dementia and Alzheimer’s, including why women are at higher risk, the worrying rise in young-onset diagnoses, and the surprising lifestyle factors that could prevent up to 45% of cases. From hearing loss and social isolation to brain stimulation and stress, she shares what we can actually do to protect our brain health. This short episode features powerful clips from their full conversations, both available to watch or listen to now. If you’re caring for a parent, worried about your own risk, or navigating the complicated emotions of dementia, this conversation is for you. Watch the full episodes with Jamie Theakston and Kimberley Wilson now. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	When was the last time you had space to feel?
0:04.0	With the National Trust, you might just find life standing still under towering trees.
0:10.0	Maybe you'll find connection among the stories of the past,
0:15.0	or a moment to disconnect from it all on a mountainside.
0:20.0	Whatever you're feeling, wherever you are, with the National Trust, you can make space to feel.
0:30.1	Do you mind talking about your dad a bit?
0:33.3	Sure.
0:33.8	Can I talk to you about that?
0:35.3	I feel like this podcast is about begin again and lots of people that watch this might be going through a phase of their life where life changes quite a lot, I think, when you're an adult and you're beginning to look after your parents.
0:55.0	Yeah. And it always seems to happen at a time in our lives when there's a load of other stuff going on as well.
1:05.0	We might have teenagers who are struggling or we might have illness or then parents.
1:14.9	And, you know, having had like the golden years of 30s, 40s, you know, career and marriage
1:22.2	and little kids, little kids, it's like the glory years.
1:26.1	And then we hit a pretty hard time.
1:29.3	Yeah.
1:30.3	How to navigate that and you were saying your mum who sounded like she was a driving force in your family.
1:36.3	Completely.
1:37.3	That you get a lot of your fire.
1:39.3	Yeah, she was an extraordinary woman and I know she was very proud of me and she was.
1:48.0	She loved her grandchildren and she loved being able to see them and find out what they've been doing.
1:55.0	And it's a sort of, there is a, you're right, there is that, there's a very blissful time
2:02.7	in our lives when our parents are still a very, still playing quite an active part in
	...

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