Overview
When it comes to families living with a person with dementia, in addition to the constant supervision and daily task fulfilment for the person with dementia who slowly would be losing their capabilities to take care of themselves, families may also find it difficult to distinguish the symptoms from the person. For instance, a person with dementia may start behaving aggressively when they hadn’t been aggressive their whole lives, or act clear one day and confused the other. This can be confusing and frustrating to deal with for the caregivers. The counsellor can pitch in and tell them that it is the disease, and not the person, making it easier to empathize and thus take care of the person with dementia. They may have feelings of guilt, anger, frustration when having to act as a constant caregiver that they may not be comfortable expressing to other family members. A counsellor can then act as a safe space for family members to express their genuine emotions. Counselling can also be useful for the person with dementia in early stages to help them handle any negative emotions that come as a result of feeling a loss of control over their life. In more progressive
dementia with enough cognitive capability sustained, counselling can still help reduce behavioural issues of the person.