Sex/uality Artifacts

Hi my name is Betsy and my artifact was on the article that was for Thursday. The article was on older adults who have dementia and have sex. I found that I can relate to this because I live with my grandparents and my grandfather has dementia. I have experienced the different stages that dementia has and how it changes over time. But since reading this article I have thought more and more about if people with Dementia should have sex. Just thinking about it makes me think that it shouldn’t be allowed because they don’t know what is going on. But my grandfather has a period of his life that he forgets but if you talk about a time in the past he can remember all of the details. That’s why I think it should be okay for them to have sex if dementia is just a period of time that is forgotten not that they can’t remember how to have sex. But the article I found talked about two patients of a nursing home who both have dementia were having sex in the nursing home. The nurse was called to the room and the woman in room was married still and the man was divorced. Like previously stated, they both had dementia. The article focused on the way that human touch doesn’t go away with age. That older adults still have sex but the conflict was that the couple was both dementia patients. That is what the huge issue is. I guess I can see that the woman was still married but maybe that was the dementia was her not remember that she was still married. I don’t know the whole story but I don’t get why is it a huge issue if people with dementia have sex. I previously last week had to write a 15 page paper on my grandma and her life experiences. One of the sections I talked about her relationship with my grandfather and their marriage. She told me that her and my grandfather have not had sex since 1992 when my grandfather was diagnosed with prostate cancer. I felt like that was a really long time but that made me realize that she never had the issue of sex with a dementia patient. But I think I could see how it’s an issue of someone who isn’t a dementia patient and one who is. I don’t think the disease is something that could be a reason why dementia and sex is not okay. I could say I agree with both sides.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2013-07-22/boomer-sex-with-dementia-foreshadowed-in-nursing-home