Atlantic Fellow Rowena Richie tried to change dementia’s tune.

One morning Page Crocker emerged from her bedroom carrying a pillow piled with stuffed animals. “It’s hard to know what to do when one has five little animals,” Page confided to her daughter and dementia care partner Temple Crocker. “Then she happily let me take her picture,” Temple reported. “But first she had to arrange the animals so they could all be seen.”

The Crockers were study participants in Rowena Richie’s pilot project, For You: Creative Engagement for Dementia Dyads. In response to Temple’s anecdote Rowena wrote “Five Little Animals,” a song celebrating Page’s tenacious personhood and motherhood as seen in her doting on stuffed animals. (Lyrics and audio recording below). The plan was to teach it to Temple and perform it as a duet for Page at their final creative engagement session. The impact was powerful. Rehearsing the song was invigorating, bonding and fun for Temple and Rowena. On the day of the performance Page arranged nine little animals so they could all see the performance, and then shocked Rowena and Temple by displaying nine fingers when they sang “five.” (See poster below).

A week later Temple texted Rowena: “I am so appreciative of what you were noticing in Mom. Her gratitude, her executive functioning, her empathy…It has helped me to notice and appreciate those things more in her. Much of the week, her dementia was in the background.”