Teun Toebes with care residence resident and ‘housemate’ Murielle (Picture: Marijke Krekels)
In Teun Toebes’s small bed room is a pub-style peanut dispenser, espresso machine, and well-stocked bar.
Within the large hall exterior are pretend vegetation and the sound of blaring televisions. It may very well be any well-appointed pupil digs, however for the previous three years the 24-year-old, who completed his Grasp’s diploma in care ethics a couple of weeks in the past, hasn’t lived in
pupil lodging.
As an alternative, he has voluntarily made his residence on the closed dementia ward of a nursing residence within the Netherlands, the nation wherein he was born, to see what it’s prefer to dwell completely in such a facility.
He eats with fellow residents, whom he regards as associates not sufferers, and calls his “housemates”, and sleeps in a room just like theirs. The one distinction is he is aware of the code to the door to the surface world.
“It’s my one large privilege,” explains Teun. “I’ve the code of the closed ward. I couldn’t dwell right here for 3 years with out it. In truth, I feel nobody can; it might go away you so closed off from the world.”
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Teun with Eugenie, spent three years dwelling alongside dementia sufferers (Picture: Marijke Krekels)
He lets the concept linger. His level being that that is how we anticipate folks dwelling with dementia to exist: reduce off, institutionalised, and remoted.
“I dwell with essentially the most stunning folks,” he continues. “On the identical time, they’re all folks with dementia. Nevertheless, that is just one attribute all of them share and it isn’t their defining attribute.
“In fact, as an individual with a illness you have particular wants from that illness, however not all of your wants as a human being are pushed solely by it.”
The Gen Z-er believes strongly that we have to destigmatise folks dwelling in care.
“We have to see folks dwelling within the nursing residence as equal human beings,” he insists.
“For instance, in the mean time, as a 24-year-old dwelling right here, I’m allowed to eat a soft-boiled egg. However at this second, my fellow residents are usually not allowed to take action as a result of there’s a worry of salmonella. We’ve got made our worry their downside.”
Having spent two years in a facility in Utrecht, for the previous yr he has been dwelling within the Inexperienced Lanes Nursing Residence, a brief distance away.
For Teun – whose mom is a psychiatric nurse and father an accountant – a typical day would possibly see Wil, 87, arriving for a correct cup of espresso and a catch-up within the morning, whereas Jopie usually pops by his room to cadge a packet of crisps.
On the first care residence, Teun made a greatest good friend in Advert, a 79-year-old dementia affected person who he’d take out to espresso outlets and giggle about life, all of the whereas watching him come alive.
All this has given him clear concepts and a exceptional, distinctive understanding about what wants to vary for a few of society’s most weak residents.
“What’s the purpose of nursing residence care?” he muses, rhetorically but with a transparent imaginative and prescient of what the reply ought to be.
“It’s high quality of life within the final part of individuals’s lives. If persons are dwelling for under a month or a yr – and the typical keep in a nursing house is simply eight months – then high quality of life ought to be crucial facet. As an alternative, the main focus is on danger administration, management and security.”
He says he could be “the final individual” to say that security will not be necessary, however he’s passionate that this shouldn’t be the overarching precept in dementia care.
“It’s all in regards to the steadiness between security and high quality of life. On this system, we primarily focus the facility of the collective on danger administration. Because of this folks’s particular person wants are usually not fulfilled.
“Nevertheless, each innovation ought to be context particular. What’s common is the human picture. We have to actually see folks dwelling with dementia as human beings with a illness, not as sufferers or shoppers. In our Western world, we wish to remedy life with care.”
Now the fascinating ebook Teun has written about his experiences as a prepared care residence resident is about to be revealed within the UK.
It’s already a bestseller within the Netherlands the place it has garnered him the ear of prime minister Mark Rutte, who shares Teun’s mystification over why these with dementia are usually not handled like abnormal folks.
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Teun with Advert (Picture: Marie Wanders)
Teun, fairly merely, desires to vary the pondering round the best way society views folks with dementia, and provided that one in 5 folks born within the UK this yr will go on to develop dementia in some unspecified time in the future of their lives, based on Alzheimers Analysis UK, it’s a dialog price having.
“I’m fortunate as a result of the care properties the place I’ve lived perceive my imaginative and prescient and my message. Each organisations have given me the belief and freedom to dwell right here, advise ministers and speak to the media.”
The care residence has additionally made it clear he’s free to report on what he sees. Sadly, what he sees is quite a lot of fakery.
“For instance, on this nursing residence they’ve spent greater than 20,000 euros on plastic pretend vegetation as a result of they have been scared my housemates have been consuming actual vegetation.”
Not solely does he ridicule this suggestion, he’s saddened by the “lifeless setting” {that a} preoccupation with danger administration creates.
“We’re so nervous about security that we aren’t letting folks with dementia dwell a full life.”
One other instance of this misplaced over-protectiveness is the so-called “magic desk” his nursing residence has invested in at huge expense.
“They’d one within the final residence I lived in too. Every prices 10,000 euro. Think about you’re sitting in your personal residence and at
a sure second there are fish swimming on the desk or butterflies whose wings will open in the event you faucet them.
“We’ve got created a surrealistic setting stuffed with digital butterflies, whereas the doorways of the actual backyard are locked as a result of we’re afraid that one thing will occur.
The Housemates by Teun Toebes is out now (Picture: )
“We’ve got to just accept that life comes with danger. If we wish zero danger, there is no such thing as a room for all times.”
Teun doesn’t pay hire for his 11-metre sq. room, which was once unused workplace house. “As an alternative, I pay when it comes to time and involvement. My hire is humanity – it’s about doing issues with my housemates. It’s about going buying with them or going to a restaurant. We’ve got no scarcity of cash or house within the Netherlands. What we now have is a scarcity of employees.”
However Teun will not be a employees member, neither is he required to organise actions for his housemates. “It’s usually about watching TV collectively or sharing a snack or a cup of tea; being a part of a neighborhood and serving to each other. I adore it,” he beams.
“My function is to not be a supervisor to vary issues on this residence, as a result of I’m a resident. My focus is on societal change.”
And it’s a two-way course of.
“I don’t solely fulfil the wants of my housemates. They fulfil my wants, for friendship and love. A very powerful lesson I’ve realized over the previous three years is that folks with dementia are nonetheless human.”
His family have been bemused when he revealed, aged 21, his plan to maneuver right into a dementia care facility regardless of being in impolite well being.
“My mom mentioned she didn’t anticipate me to dwell in a nursing residence earlier than her. Now I by no means talk about it with family and friends. It’s fully normalised. It’s simply my way of life, however the reality the media are so involved in me reveals that we aren’t used to this integration.” Teun believes that this wants to vary.
Through the previous few years he has additionally been engaged on a documentary, Human Eternally, that would be the opening movie for a G20 summit round dementia this October.
In it, he seems to be at how completely different cultures take care of dementia and what we will be taught from them to make the longer term extra inclusive.
He was struck by the care in Moldova the place folks with dementia live alongside folks with autism and younger folks with melancholy.
“All of them have completely different wants, to allow them to assist one another. All my housemates have a sure want however it’s the identical want so they can not assist one another. Not solely ought to younger and previous dwell collectively, everybody ought to dwell extra collectively.
“However once we put labels on folks in our world, that’s the approach we exclude teams who don’t match the norm.” Whereas finding out, he says he realized methodology, methods and concept, however being an equal housemate has taught him “to hear”.
However Teun, who can be engaged on a brand new ebook, admits that this isn’t a life that he’ll select for much longer.
“The documentary can be aired in October. That can be a great second to proceed my mission in one other approach. Residing in a nursing residence shouldn’t be my purpose. My purpose is to enhance the standard of life of individuals dwelling with dementia.”
- The Housemates by Teun Toebes (September Publishing, £12.99) is out now. Go to expressbookshop.com or name Categorical Bookshop on 020 3176 3832. Free UK P&P on orders over £25