When Care Feels Like a Test: Rethinking Engagement in Late-Stage Dementia

Do you remember?

You’re at a gathering with someone close to you - business or personal, but you’re there together. Someone approaches, animated and warm. They clearly know you well - but their name escapes you. You smile, respond politely, stall. Because you know what’s coming.

The introduction.

And you know you can’t do it. The name just isn’t there. You feel the heat rise in your chest. The moment stretches. What should have been connection becomes quiet shame.

That moment -of knowing you’re about to fail, of trying to delay the exposure - is familiar to many living with late-stage dementia. It’s not the forgetting that hurts. It’s the expectation. The pressure to perform what you know you can’t. And when that pressure is repeated, day after day, it must become unbearable.

In care settings, this pressure often hides behind good intentions. We call it “stimulation,” “support,” “meaningful activity.” But when the interaction is built around a correct answer, a fixed sequence, or a measurable outcome, it becomes a test and one that sets up failure. 

And when someone fails that test enough times, I'm sure they stop trying. Not because they don’t care - but because they’re protecting what’s left of their dignity.

Designing for Presence, Not Performance

At Timeless Presents, we don’t ask people to remember. We ask 'ourselves' to remember who they are.

Our products are intentionally open-ended. They don’t rely on sequencing, correctness, or completion. Instead, they invite curiosity, familiarity, and emotional resonance. Our new Advent Activity, for example, includes numbered pieces - but those numbers aren’t the goal. They’re just one possible entry point, potentially more useful for the carer than the person with dementia. The real invitation is to engage together, without pressure or expectation.

We design for moments of connection. For the quiet joy of placing a piece because it feels right, not because it’s “correct.” For the shared glance, the gentle touch, the memory that surfaces not through demand, but through presence.

This isn’t a lack of structure. It’s a reframing of what structure is for. Not to measure cognition, but to scaffold dignity.

A Call to the Sector

If we want to support people living with late-stage dementia, we must stop asking them to pass tests they didn’t sign up for. We must stop measuring care by cognitive output. And we must stop confusing stimulation with pressure.

Instead, we can design for emotional safety. For relational immediacy. For the kind of presence that doesn’t require memory, but still honours legacy.

Because when we stop asking people to perform, we start showing up beside them. And that’s where care begins.