Before my mother's diagnosis with Alzheimer's, I had heard of the disease, but hadn't known anyone who had suffered from it.
Dementia is often regarded as an embarrassing condition that should be hushed up and not spoken about. But I feel passionately that more needs to be done to raise awareness, which is why I became an ambassador for the Alzheimer's Society.
You can't converse with Alzheimer's sufferers in the way you do with others; the dialogue tends to go round in circles.