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Welcome to the Guardian Longread, showcasing the best long-form journalism covering culture, politics and new thinking.

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I knew the terror of lost time.

How my father's dementia echoed my own alcoholism by Octavia Bright.

The radio was playing in the background of my parents' kitchen the first time my father forgot how to eat.

It was July 2015 and the news was bad.

My parents and I sat around the table where they had first taught me how to use a spoon.

Though it was a mild night, my father huddled against the radiator for warmth.

I can't remember what to do, he said.

He held his empty fork before him as though it were an alien object.

What do I do, he asked, a tremor in his voice, with this?

My mother's fork was hidden in a twist of pasta that she had tweld up from her plate against the curve of her spoon,

and he looked from it to his own in confusion.

In the lamp light, fear changed the shape of his eyes.

He knew a fork is not something you forget how to use.

I glanced at my mother. She and I were now on the same side of an invisible boundary separating us

from this man we loved. We jumped into action, wanting to wrap him in humour and solutions.

...