‘Please know you’re not alone’: For dementia caregivers, a place to share with strangers — and be honest

Barbara Metcalf and Mary Smallwood live 826 miles apart. They’ve never met in person. If not for a chance interaction on Facebook, they would have stayed strangers. But for months, the two women talked nearly every day, swapping stories and venting about their husbands, who both have dementia.

Their husbands’ symptoms have manifested in particularly difficult, deeply isolating ways. They blamed their wives for their conditions. They blamed their wives for losing their jobs. They blamed their wives because they couldn’t drive anymore. They accused them of having affairs with the mailman or stealing their money. They urinated all over their houses, leaving the women cleaning for hours.

“It was a constant battle of trying to keep him clean, keep him from