In her memoir, Remembering the Music, Forgetting the Words: Travels with Mom in the Land of Dementia, Kate Whouley strips away the romantic veneer of mother-daughter love to bare the toothed and tough reality of caring for a parent who is slowly losing her mind. In an interview we conducted at Whouley's home on Cape Cod, she recounted some of the lessons she learned as dementia took away her mother's ability to care for herself.  

In these YouTube videos, Whouley discusses her decision to find an assisted living facility to care for her mother, the fears that family and friends face as their loved one loses the ability to recognize them, and how her mother's disease taught her to live moment by moment. 

Assisted Living: Making a Tough Decision

Alzheimer's and Dementia: Getting Past Our Fears

Caring for a Loved One with Alzheimer's: Living in the Moment