For families living with dementia, finding a place where they can socialize without worrying about whether a loved one will feel uncomfortable, overwhelmed or out of place can be difficult.
HOPE Dementia Support HOPEs to make that a little easier this fall with the launch of a new Memory Cafe at Prairie Tavern, bringing one of its community connection programs to north Clark County.
The Memory Cafe will meet monthly on the first Friday of each month, beginning Oct. 2, according to HOPE Dementia Support Program Manager Julie Donovan. Prairie Tavern is located at 14925 NE Caples Road in Brush Prairie.
The new location is intended to provide an accessible gathering place for people living with dementia and their care partners without requiring them to travel to Vancouver.
“I would say one of our goals is to create a space in that area, right? Not everybody having to come to a central location in Vancouver, right? That's not their community,” Donovan said. “And that's what I love about the Memory Cafes, right? They can exist in a community, and it's a wonderful way, especially moving into North Clark County, that is a way to support people there.”
The response to the new cafe has already been strong. Donovan said the announcement had received more than 700 reactions and roughly 30 comments on Facebook, significantly more engagement than the organization typically sees when discussing dementia.
“We're really excited about this,” Donovan said.
The organization already operates two monthly Memory Cafes at Cameo Cafe in Vancouver. The gatherings are designed for people living with dementia and their care partners and are open to the broader community, regardless of whether participants are involved in one of HOPE Dementia Support’s other programs.
The cafes are intended to provide a relaxed social environment where people can connect without the pressure that can sometimes accompany unfamiliar public settings.
“It's about being in a social situation in a way that feels safe, right?” Donovan said. “So it's not scary for the person living with dementia, and it's not nerve-wracking for the person who is their care partner.”
The cafes typically include an activity, such as trivia focused on older television shows, along with time for conversation and socializing.
At the Cameo Cafe location, one of the monthly gatherings typically draws about 20 people or more, Donovan said.
The environment is intentionally designed around comfort and familiarity. At cafe gatherings, HOPE Dementia Support generally uses separate rooms and name tags so participants do not have to worry about remembering everyone's name.
For the restaurant menu, a smaller selection is made available with pictures, descriptions and prices to make choosing a meal easier.
Erin Bennett, HOPE Dementia Support’s volunteer coordinator, said the gatherings offer care partners an opportunity to simply spend time with others in a normal social setting.
“I think it's a time for people to just live how they normally had gone about their day …” Bennett said. “So (it) gives them that chance to just go break bread, meet new people.”
Bennett also said the Memory Cafe provides an opportunity for community members and employees at participating businesses to become more familiar with dementia.
“And also the cafe employees and staff members, same with Prairie Tavern, giving them a chance to get exposed to this because they probably meet other people that might have something similar or might be able to guide and direct it so that they can interact,” Bennett said.
Additional programs highlight
That broader awareness is part of HOPE Dementia Support’s larger mission.
HOPE Dementia Support is a program of CDM Caregiving Services and serves people living with dementia, their care partners and families, as well as others in the community.
“The central part of what we do are support groups,” Donovan said.
The organization offers weekly support groups for care partners throughout Southwest Washington and in areas of Portland, as well as two groups in southern Oregon. It also offers two groups for people living with early-stage dementia and their care partners, where participants initially meet together before separating into their own facilitated support groups.
A separate group, called New Beginnings, is available for people who have lost someone to dementia.
All of the support groups are open to the community and come at no cost to participants, Donovan said.
HOPE Dementia Support also operates Music and Memories groups in Vancouver and Kelso. Led by a certified music therapist, the gatherings are designed for people living with dementia and their care partners.
“Music is really meaningful in dementia,” Donovan said. “We say that music is magic, right? Because it brings up memories, it brings up the words.”
The organization also offers a wide range of activities intended to help people living with dementia remain connected to their communities.
Its Meet Me At programs include monthly daytime movies at Kiggins Theatre in downtown Vancouver, where the theater keeps the lights low, offers closed captioning and encourages singing along to musical films.
HOPE Dementia Support also partners with local museums, the wildlife refuge, an art studio, Metropolitan Performing Arts and Silver Buckle Youth Equestrian Center.
At the equestrian program, participants can interact with horses while staff and trained 4-H volunteers introduce the animals and share their histories.
A new Meet Me at the Kit-Tea Cafe program was also recently added.
“These are all really designed to be inclusive, and create a feeling of safety,” Donovan said.
Most of the programs are offered at no cost, with HOPE Dementia Support using grants and donations to fund them. For people connected to HOPE attending the movies, the cost is $2.
The organization also provides weighted baby dolls and pets through its Mary Ann's Babies and Pets program. Donovan said the items can be comforting for people as dementia progresses, particularly for those who may connect with the experience of caring for a baby or pet earlier in life.
The organization provides the items free upon request.
HOPE Dementia Support also distributes dementia activity boxes. Originally developed for use in hospitals, the boxes contain safe objects for people to look at, touch and interact with, particularly in unfamiliar and potentially overwhelming environments such as emergency rooms.
Families have also begun using the boxes as personalized activity and conversation kits by adding family photographs and other familiar objects.
Another resource is HOPE Walks, a series of trail maps developed specifically with people living with dementia and their care partners in mind.
The maps simplify traditional trail maps and identify practical information such as parking-to-trail access, surface type, inclines and declines, wheelchair and walker accessibility, seating and restroom locations.
“They reduce all the peripheral things on maps, right, they're not as busy,” Donovan said.
The maps are printed on waterproof paper and also include sensory activities intended to encourage people to notice things along the trail.
In addition to direct programming, HOPE Dementia Support provides community presentations covering topics including dementia basics, what to do following a diagnosis, Dementia Friends, brain health and dementia awareness, and advanced care planning.
The organization also works to help people complete health care and financial powers of attorney before they are no longer able to make those decisions themselves.
“We really want people who are living with dementia, or aging, to get that paperwork in order, so they can have, they can have their say in the decisions that are being made,” Donovan said.
A need for volunteers and donations
HOPE Dementia Support is largely volunteer-run. Donovan said the organization has three part-time employees totaling 2.25 full-time-equivalent positions.
Bennett said volunteers and donors are essential to maintaining the organization's programs and expanding its reach.
“We're run by grants and donations, people who might not have somebody currently living with the situation, but they want to be able to help and support their support and care through those donations, helps us to help others,” Bennett said.
The organization is also seeking volunteers and ambassadors, including people who may want to help facilitate support groups or assist with other programs.
“We would love and welcome any conversation,” Bennett said.
For HOPE Dementia Support, the new Prairie Tavern Memory Cafe is another step toward creating communities where people living with dementia and their families can remain connected rather than becoming increasingly isolated.
Donovan said caregiving can cause a person's social world to shrink as more time is spent on medical appointments and caregiving responsibilities.
“Your universe keeps shrinking, right?” Donovan said. “As more time is taken up with that, you know, your friends may stop visiting, it's uncomfortable, you're doing more doctor's appointments or whatever that may be, your world shrinks.”
Building community
The organization's goal, she said, is to help people continue participating in the communities and activities they have always enjoyed.
The Prairie Tavern partnership is part of that effort. Donovan said the tavern's owners have embraced the program and were already displaying a “Welcome Memory Cafe” message when HOPE representatives visited.
“And mostly we love partnering with community, right? So community partners are a key part of what we do,” Donovan said.
Bennett said those partnerships can also help people recognize that they are not alone.
“You'd be surprised at how many people are living silently with this and didn't know that it's a community of their neighbors who are also dealing with it,” Bennett said.
The organization is also discussing the possibility of establishing another Memory Cafe in Kelso as it continues expanding into rural communities.
Donovan said the Prairie Tavern cafe had already registered 10 people before its first gathering.
Bennett said the Prairie Tavern space can accommodate between 80 and 100 people, giving HOPE Dementia Support room to grow the program while maintaining smaller, more intimate gatherings when appropriate.
“It can really go anywhere and serve anyone,” Bennett said. “It's just we want to be able to provide the need when it's available.”
For HOPE Dementia Support, that need goes beyond dementia-specific services. The organization wants to create opportunities for people to continue living their lives, maintaining connections and participating in their communities.
And for families navigating dementia, Bennett said, even a simple gathering around a table can provide an important connection.
“It's a great way to create connection amongst strangers in that and open the conversation a little bit more for people to talk about and not feel so isolated and alone,” Bennett said.
For more information on HOPE Dementia Support programs, visit HOPEdementiasupport.org.
