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A True Support Group
May 26, 2010
My Friend's Place volunteer Bobbie Fowler discusses a vocabulary project with Shellie Morcom.
Photo By: Leslie Bowman
Alzheimer's and dementia are debilitating conditions that affect the whole family. Luckily, the afflicted and their loved ones don't have to go it alone.
For years, Shellie Morcom, 58, worked as a women’s health nurse practitioner at the Cutler Medical Center on the campus of the University of Maine in Orono. Her husband, Mike Morcom, says she was an outgoing and respected member of the medical community. That was before she developed early-onset Alzheimer’s disease.
“It almost crushes me to think about it,” Mike Morcom says.
As his wife became confused, she began to withdraw, and many of her former connections began to fall away. “Friends just don’t know how to act around her, so they just don’t come around,” Morcom says.
At first, Morcom could find little help for her in the community. While there were support groups for caregivers of those suffering with Alzheimer’s, he couldn’t find a support group for people wrestling with the disease. Then he heard about a new program called Memory Joggers at My Friend’s Place, a nonprofit adult social program at the First United Methodist Church in Bangor. Memory Joggers is designed to help those in the early stages of Alzheimer’s and memory loss remain social and active.
While at the program, Shellie Morcom interacts with others in the same mental boat. She also engages in mental and physical cross-training to help her stay focused. Mike says the program has been a lifeline for both of them. He knows she’s in good hands and it’s slowed the spiral of withdrawal.
“It’s just a way for me to know she’s well taken care of. She’s respected,” Morcom says.
Since 2001, My Friend’s Place has held adult day services for people suffering from memory loss and dementia, or who are socially isolated. In 2009, Barbara Fister, director of My Friend’s Place, launched Memory Joggers. Each Monday from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m., people who are just beginning to be affected with these conditions gather to play games, exercise, and discuss health topics of relevance. While the adult day services and Memory Jogger programs are similar, everything is done with more depth at Memory Joggers, Fister says.
“You can see in early memory loss, they still feel they have a lot more living to go and they still want to learn,” Fister says.
It’s the only program in Maine targeted for those in the early stages of Alzheimer’s or dementia, and it has proven so popular that Fister has had to split the group in two to accommodate the numbers.
There are two models for adult day services, says Deborah Poulton, director of family caregiver services at Bangor’s Eastern Area Agency on Aging. Social models, like My Friend’s Place, are designed to help those who do not need hygiene care while attending. Social model-based programs are popular in more urban areas, where other services are more readily available. Medical-model day programs, which can offer showers and other personal care maintenance, are more popular in rural areas, where services are fewer and distances greater.
“Adult day care is not a brand-new concept,” says Poulton. “However, it’s becoming a much more integral part of our long-term care system out of monetary necessity.” As the American population grays, there’s a growing understanding that it’s much cheaper and more effective to keep people living at home, rather than in a nursing home, for as long as possible, she says.
Friendship Cottage, a medical-model adult day program for those with physical, mental, or memory challenges in Blue Hill, offers an adult day service program five days a week. As the name implies, it feels more like a vacation retreat than an adult day program. The main room is open and airy, with abundant windows. Plush recliners invite participants to lounge and try their hands at a jigsaw puzzle. Others play Bingo and socialize sitting at a carved wooden table in the center of the room. Even menus and regulations are pretty and displayed in frames.
“I just love this place. They do such wonderful things here,” says John “Dan” Morris Danielson, a participant.
The smile on his face fades when he can’t remember how many days a week he comes to the program. Friendship Cottage executive director Anne Ossana puts a hand on his shoulder and shows him three fingers.
“Are you sure?” Danielson asks. Ossana’s smile never wavers, nor does it look forced. The smile returns to Danielson’s face. “Well, if you say so,” he chuckles.
There is still no cure for Alzheimer’s and dementia, so Ossana knows her job is more about support than rehabilitation. She says her program strives to provide dignity for participants. “Our goal is just to meet people where they are,” she says.
Tucked away are rooms for helping participants with personal care, like showering and going to the bathroom. These services can make the difference between living at home and institutionalization for some participants, says Ossana.
The second floor of the facility houses another mission of Friendship Cottage. There’s a comfortable room filled with couches and chairs for caregivers, where they can come to network with each other, look for resources, or just decompress. Nearby, there’s an office dedicated to coordinating caregiver assistance.
“Eighty percent of long-term care for Alzheimer’s patients is done in the home,” says Sonia Turanski, community caregiver advocate at Friendship Cottage.
Marshall Smith, a retired doctor in Blue Hill, can attest to that. Before Friendship Cottage opened, Smith tried to take care of his wife, Marjorie, while juggling other commitments. He even took her with him to board meetings, but she grew bored and distracted. Smith was beginning to wonder if he would have to retire from public life when he heard about Friendship Cottage. Marjorie became the cottage’s first client, even before it officially opened its doors. When his wife is at the cottage, Smith says he has the time and space to take care of himself. “It has saved my life,” he says.
Through a grant from the Maryland-based Harry and Jeanette Weinberg Foundation, Turanski is working to help caregivers find the services they need in Hancock County. The grant is part of the foundation’s family and informal caregiver support program, and will help to identify caregiver services in Hancock County and then try and replicate those services in neighboring Washington County.
Turanski hopes to create a self-sustaining network for the caregivers of those with memory loss or Alzheimer’s. As the U.S. population ages, she says, there’s a growing understanding that a web of care is needed.
“You’ve heard the saying, ‘It takes a village to raise a child,’” she says. “Actually, it takes a village for a whole lifespan.”
Memory Joggers Article in Bangor Daily News
January 11, 2010
Memory Joggers Program Expands
JUDY HARRISON
OF THE NEWS STAFF
BANGOR DAILY NEWS
Publication Date: Monday, November 23, 2009
Page: 5 Section: b Edition: all
BANGOR - When Ronald Newcomb was diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease six years ago, one of the first questions his daughter asked the doctor was, "Is there a support group he can attend?"
The answer was no, Jane Campbell, 44, of Brewer, said earlier this month. She kept asking and late last year, Campbell finally got the answer she had been hoping for.
Now Newcomb, 71, of Hampden, spends four hours every Monday at Memory Joggers, a program for people suffering from early memory loss, at the First United Methodist Church on Essex Street in Bangor.
"I felt it was very important for him to socialize with other people with memory loss," she said. "Since he's been coming here, he's much more confident with people."
Memory Joggers is one of just 14 programs in the country designed to help people suffering from early memory loss, director Barbara Fister said earlier this month. The program is the only one of its kind in New England, she said.
Fister also runs My Friend's Place, an adult day care program at the church.
The first Memory Joggers session was held on Jan. 5 and has been held nearly every Monday since then. A new session on Wednesdays was added on Nov. 12. Participants attend from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. once a week and bring a brown bag lunch.
" Memory Joggers offers a stimulating and supportive atmosphere in which to enjoy physical, social and educational activities aimed at memory enhancement," the brochures describing the program state.
Each day has a theme and activities are planned around that theme, Fister said. Mental exercises include word jumbles, crosswords, songs and poetry. Games such as horseshoes and beanbag tosses and stretching and flexibility activities exercise the body, she said. The participants also play board games.
The people participating range in age from 58 to 91. A group with six to eight participants works best, but more than that and it becomes a bit too difficult to include everyone in all the activities, Fister said. Another day was added to keep the "class size" small, she said.
Most people who participate are either dropped off or drive themselves to the church, according to Fister. Campbell accompanies her father to assist him if he needs help communicating because the disease is affecting Newcomb's ability to form words quickly and to speak loudly enough to be heard.
"This gives me an opportunity to be with him, which I love," Campbell said, "and it gives my mom, who is his primary caregiver, an opportunity to have some time to herself."
She said that the themes used for each day's events help the participants concentrate. The theme on the Monday before Veterans Day focused on the holiday. The group spent time making lists of what the holiday meant to them, then shared memories sparked by those lists.
Peggy Beitzell, 79, of Bangor remembered air raid drills, blackout curtains, and keeping sand on the roof in case a fire started during a bombing.
"Of course, we never did get bombed," she said.
The social aspect of the program is just as important as those aimed at memory enhancement, according to Campbell.
"People who have this disease tend to sit and not continue with their regular lives," she said. "[Dad] looks forward to coming and has formed relationships with everyone here. When they all participate, they learn from each other."
Newcomb no longer is able to do the fly-tying for which he is well-known, but he still attends meetings at area salmon clubs to spend time with old friends, his daughter said.
"I like the camaraderie and I like the people," Lloyd Willey, 76, of Hampden, said of Memory Joggers. "They can cope with me."
Willey, who owns Canteen Service Co., continues to go to his office on Perry Road in Bangor for about two hours each day even though he has turned day-to-day operations over to his son.
"They put up with me," he said, "but I think it's good for employee relations since I'm still chairman of the company."
Memory Joggers is supported by grants from the Brookdale Foundation of New York City, the Maine Community Foundation, United Way of Eastern Maine and-in kind contributions from the First United Methodist Church of Bangor, according to Fister.
For information about Memory Joggers, call 945-0122 or visit www.memoryjoggersprogram.com.
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