Kitty Norton
- Kitty Norton Pippa Kelly 48:15
Kitty Norton describes herself as a former “just about everything – from non-profits arts administrator to cabaret performer to post-production professional to crappiest daughter of the year award-winner for more than forty years”.
She forfeited that last accolade when, six years after her mum was diagnosed with vascular dementia, and following the sudden death of her dad, she gave up her job with NBC in Los Angeles to move back to Oregon so that she and her sister could provide their mum with the best possible dementia care.
To get her through this unplanned turn in her career, Kitty started a blog called Stumped Town Dementia. The blog brought her a temporary escape from dementia as well as countless virtual caregiver friends from all over the world who supported her with their understanding comments, emails and Zoom dates.
When her mum died in 2021, Kitty decided she wanted to meet the virtual friends who had become so very important to her as she cared for her mum and, in her words, “Sit out on a summer’s night, open a couple of bottles of wine, and find healing in the camaraderie of a fellow dementia caregiver”.
She then went and did just that. The result is an incredible 90 minute film charting the 75 hundred miles and 27 states that Kitty covered in 26 days. Wine, Women and Dementia has already been garlanded with awards. It’s produced by some serious professionals and features caregivers Kitty encountered through her blog, including former Well I Know Now guest and host of Daughterhood, the Podcast, Rosanne Corcoran.
Like Stumped Town Dementia, Wine, Women and Dementia pulls no punches. Its protagonists, the caregivers, are strong, articulate women with fire (and possibly the odd drop of rose or Californian white) in their belly. It’s a rollicking, funny, sad, informative, supportive must-watch for all family caregivers, for policy makers and anyone remotely interested in dementia – or perhaps, simply for everyone.
You can find information on when Kitty’s film will be available here in the UK at the website https://www.winewomenanddementia.com/ and you can find her blog at https://www.stumpedtowndementia.com/
Wine, Women and Dementia will be available online in support of Dementia Action Week, May 13-19. Registration is free or, if you are able to support the film’s continued outreach to family carers, a donation would be very welcome.
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