Christmas activities for people with dementia

If you care for someone who has dementia, a shared activity can make both of you happier and able to enjoy quality time together.

This can be particularly true at Christmas, when you may be spending more time than usual together. At Bluebird Care in Calderdale and Bradford, we believe in keeping as active and engaged as possible.

Keeping in touch with people is good for confidence and mental wellbeing, so try to make opportunities for meeting up with friends and family at Christmas.

Although regular dementia-friendly exercise, dance or movement classes may be cancelled over the holiday period, walking is a great alternative and there may even be some organised walks that you can join.

If you’re looking for something to do indoors, then arts-based activities such as drawing, painting and crafts or knitting can be good options.

A holiday period is also a good time for reminiscence. People with dementia can be encouraged to share their life experiences and stories from their past with photos, objects, video and music clips. These can be collated in a scrapbook or on a tablet or other digital device

Music and singing are known to improve mood and wellbeing. They are also great fun and, for many people, Christmas is a time to re-visit songs and melodies they have known throughout their lives. People with dementia can respond very well to this combination of memory and music.

Many households are digitally connected, which opens up a huge range of online games, puzzles and dedicated dementia apps. It also means that you can Zoom with old friends. Meanwhile, YouTube, is full of memories in the form of old TV programmes, films, clips, classic adverts, music videos and footage of locations close to hoem. All can be useful when spending time with a person who has dementia.

In the later stages of dementia activities can continue, but they will often need to be simplified and are more likely to be of benefit if they focus on the senses. Again, playing music can be very effective, as can having objects to touch and interact with. This can be combined with hand massage which works well for many people with dementia in the later stages.