While it may not feel like it when you’re potting around the garden at your own pace, but, it’s important to recognise that gardening is actually a fantastic way to keep fit and active. Going backward and forwards for your pots, carrying bags of compost, and scooping up leaves with a rake are all hard work, and can offer great benefits for people with dementia.

Gardening and Dementia

Just think, whether you’re digging, weeding, planting, pruning, raking, or mowing, you’re being very active. While burning calories and maintaining muscle strength is important, there’s also benefits to dexterity as well. Aside from the physical benefits of being active in your garden, it’s also a great excuse to structure a routine around your outdoor exploits too, especially if you have sheltered outdoor spaces available which can be used all year round.

For those living with dementia, gardening and nature are brilliant but for a variety of other reasons. Firstly, gardens are great places to socialise and relax in. You’re not rushed when you’re in a garden, you can amble about at your own pace, chatting as you go. Whilst simultaneously taking in the sights, smells, and sounds around you.

This sensory aspect of gardens is one of the things which makes them so great. For people with dementia, every moment matters, and completing activities in the here and now can help to raise you and your loved one’s spirits. They can touch the petals, see the different textures of the leaves, smell the aromas of the freshly cut grass and the flowering plants, plus you can hear the bees, birds, and children running around.

This often brings a fantastic chance for people with dementia to reminisce, for example, seeing apples dangling from the trees can bring back memories of scrumping in younger years. If your loved one wasn’t so adventurous, it’s likely that they’ll have enjoyed taking part in a tallest sunflower competition or when they gaze in awe everytime they see a towering foxglove.

These moments which stimulate the senses and memory whilst also bringing physical challenges are what make our gardens so fantastic, and is why we work tirelessly on ours at Athena Care Homes.

If you’d like more information on what additional dementia support your local Athena Care Home can offer, don’t hesitate to reach out to our friendly team here.