Although Dad was fit, running into his early 80s, we started to notice something wasn’t right when he began to forget things. We tried to get him to go and see a doctor, which was a battle in itself. However, we eventually managed to get him there and following a referral he was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease in 2011.

From then, Dad’s condition inevitably deteriorated, initially at a slow pace, latterly much more quickly. At first his short-term memories started to disappear, and then he lost any ability to make the simplest of choices and decisions, like choosing from a restaurant menu. Socialising in a group was impossible, and he developed a compulsive need to check things. His walking gradually became more unsteady, leading to a few trips and falls.

As time went by he became very uncooperative , refusing to do what Mum asked him on a daily basis, causing a huge amount of emotional upset.

In the last couple of years before he died, Dad could no longer verbalise what he was thinking. After a while he pretty much stopped talking at all, and for Mum, the house became a silent place, which was really tough for her: her partner of more than 60 years no longer able to ask or answer a question, or have any kind of conversation.

By late 2018 Dad started to behave aggressively, and would curse and swear at Mum. At times he could be physically aggressive. This was not the man we had known: this was not my dad who, throughout his life previously, was the most polite and lovely man. I had never even heard him swear before he developed Alzheimer’s disease.

This illness had stolen my dad.

The first sings that something was wrong was when Mum’s normal character seemed to dial up a few notches. At first our arguments would seem different, lasting for days rather than hours. I’d anguish over what I’d done so wrong to upset her

She’d get confused when out in the car, even though she’d lived in the area her whole life. I vividly remember one day Mum came to pick me up from the set of Coronation Street, which she knew so well. But she got lost for two hours trying to find me, with no mobile phone. Now, of course, she doesn’t drive and giving up that part of her independence was tough to negotiate in the beginning.

The past became so present for Mum. Rather than focusing on the practicalities of day-to-day life, she’d tell stories about her childhood that she’d never talked about before. Seeking comfort in those memories that she could still find and enjoy.

Mum is a headstrong lady and looking back, she covered the cracks for about three years before her diagnosis. None of us knew much about dementia before that. But when the diagnosis came, it was there in black and white: Alzheimers dementia.

Then life started to change for us.

Today, Mum still loves singing, watching her soap operas and murder mysteries, and hearing about the family and our lives. But every day, every hour, every second can be different. Some days we laugh and laugh together, some days Mum just can’t find comfort in anything we try to offer. And every day we learn something new about how to help her.

Caring for mum is a family affair – split between me, my brother, one of my sisters and my son, with caring support from a family friend. There’s also great support from the local health authority and district nurses. Between us we’ve learnt the art of patience and negotiation, and the value of information.

There is so much stigma about dementia. This weighs strongly on mum and to this day, she’s struggled to accept her diagnosis.

We watch mum trying, and failing, to come to terms with the idea of dementia. And that’s heartbreaking. Because it’s been less painful for her to shy away from the perceived stigma of the diagnosis than to share it, and that’s where things need to change for future generations. Alzheimer has definitely made Mum more socially isolated, and more and more of today’s older generation is facing this future. It’s also isolating for carers, like me and my siblings. In our community it’s normal for everyone to know everyone else’s business, it’s a very social affair. But when you’re struggling to cover cracks in normal life, it can also create a real social pressure.

Talking about dementia, and the value of research, is vital. It’s such an important way to break down these stigmas.

If we can talk about dementia and share experiences without judgement or taboo, we can create support systems and help people contribute for longer within society. We can also help people accept that they might be changing and adapt the world to make their lives easier. Dementia is caused by diseases, there is no shame in that. Everyone is human and at some stage in our lives we’ll all get ill.

My hope for the future is that if my family has been brave enough to speak out about dementia, we might help others. And together, we’ll break down that stigma and support research into this debilitating disease.

Mum and Dad had been together since their teens and were still so romantic, happy and loving together. They were always holding hands, hugging and laughing and they gave me and my sister a wonderful example of what a good, strong marriage should look like. Don’t get me wrong, they weren’t perfect – obviously they argued like everyone else and I’m sure they’d say there were times they found things hard, but ultimately they were a really strong team and were always there for each other.

The Alzheimer’s diagnosis floored them, coming only four years after my mum had been diagnosed with breast cancer.

While cancer was horrible, scary and a massive shock, being told Mum had Alzheimer’s was a whole new ball game. We all knew there was no chance of treatment and recovery. Mum had got better from her cancer – she never would from this.

As the disease progressed, it became obvious that she needed full-time care. Financially this was hard, and I can’t even imagine the emotional strain this must have put him under. He didn’t moan or complain about this though – to him this was the obvious step and what he wanted to do to make life better for Mum and to know she was safe.

Eventually Mum and Dad had to move from the three-bed semi-detached house they both loved, to a much smaller but more practical bungalow. He wanted to keep her at home and look after her as long as he was physically able. I know he felt like he was letting her down and it was awful to see him feeling that way. It took Dad a long time to accept that he had done everything he could.

Mum would 100 per cent have told him this herself if she was able, but of course she couldn’t, so the rest of us tried as hard as we could to help him come to terms with it. After a few months Dad realised he wanted to carry on in his role as a carer, this time employed in a nursing home specialising in people with dementia.

Honestly, if you’d asked me, my sister and my mum if that would have been his future career we would have laughed, but I really think it was the job he was meant to do and Mum’s illness helped him see that.

I only had one grandparent growing up. This was my paternal grandmother. She was always very physically active, with a full head of brown hair and a determined attitude. She’d constantly be travelling between her three children’s homes; doing the chores and helping with the grandkids.

She was feisty and stubborn and she seemed immortal. The entire extended family used to joke that she would live forever. A small part of me was convinced she would. Then she started to forget things.

She would get confused about which bus to catch. She’d do the washing up twice because she’d forget the first time. She’d forget to come visit or pick up the groceries. She’d get our names mixed up.

She was old, so we all laughed it off. But it got worse and worse, and eventually her kids got worried enough to take her to the GP. The diagnosis came. Alzheimer’s disease. She likely had a few years left.

Difficult questions started. Could she be trusted with her own money? How long could she safely live alone, having been fiercely independent for decades?

Money would go missing from her bank account. She would leave the house in the middle of the night and forget to eat or take her pills.

Looking back, I didn’t cope well with my nan’s dementia. I fled to the other side of the country and studied pharmacology at university, with a special focus on neurodegenerative disorders like Alzheimer’s disease.

Four years of study later and nan was still with us, even though I had no answers about her condition. The scientific community has dozens of theories but no life-changing treatments yet. Ways to slow the symptoms but no cures.

However, the thing I did take away from university was that more dementia research is needed so that scientists can make those breakthroughs.

Even towards the end of her life, my nan lived up to her reputation. The doctors gave her a few years at best, but she was still alive ten years after her diagnosis. Eventually her brain seemed to give up completely and she died in 2017, aged 83.

I have many memories of my nan, but one stands out. I was back from university for Christmas, and I went with my dad to visit her. She was curled up in her armchair in the home, a space she never moved from. Dad chatted to her for an hour but he had no response until she lifted her head and looked at him.

In the first fully coherent thing she had said in around five years, in a voice that sounded like the immortal lady that used to put me to bed, she said, “thank you for doing this for me”.

"I was young, I guess I was about 6 years old, when my grandmother was diagnosed with Alzheimer's dementia. At that time, I could not understand the weight of everything that was happening, but I felt it very well. My brother and I spent a lot of time with our grandparents, we were very attached to them. They were relatively young grandparents, so they took care of us with a lot of energy and enthusiasm. They were constantly devising new activities to entertain us. At the moment when we started noticing that something was happening to my grandmother, she was only 56 years old. Today, I know that there is a small percentage of people who get Alzheimer's disease before the age of 65. My grandmother was within that percentage. It all started with forgetting the stove on, forgetting the things to buy in the store, later my brother and I noticed her confusion when she took us to the usual places, as if she didn't know where she was. On one occasion, my grandparents took us to the Museum. We looked at a setting related to the Middle Ages. At one point, my grandmother approached the curator and asked him, "Excuse me, where is the fruit section?" After a moment of silence, which seemed like an eternity, during which I kept looking at the floor, and I think everyone else was looking at my grandmother with eyes wide open, the curator laughed. Grandpa's expression was as if he was frozen. He roughly took grandma under her arm, and muttered to us to go outside. He was furious. He seemed angry with grandma, with us, and with the whole world. Grandma cried as we drove home. This memory still hurts me today. Grandma was not to blame, nor responsible for what happened to her.

It took time and a lot of patience, love and active participation of each of us (to the best of our ability), for the family to stay on their feet coping with my grandmother's illness. I would like to tell everyone that the most important thing is to become aware of the problem in time, recognize it and start organizing a new system immediately. Because it really, literally, becomes a new system. In it, you have to rely on each other and be sure to connect with the health and social services. No one can do this alone."