ABSTRACT
Constructions of ageing suggest that cognitive declines associated with dementia are inevitable. This myth contributes to stigma, which leads to limiting the potential for quality of life. Opportunities to pursue life-enriching relationships between people living with dementia and children are especially limited in institutional care settings like long-term care where a culture of protection against risks is prioritized. Acceptance of this intergenerational isolation brings threats of reproducing a culture of stigma and fear towards people living with dementia, while dismissing the possibility and need for these relationships. This chapter integrates the theories of relational caring and lived childhoods as a promising theoretical framework to support relationships between people living with dementia and children. Representing a paradigm shift in dementia care, relational caring recognizes that compassionate relationships are at the core of human wellness and that human beings learn, evolve, and thrive optimally within reciprocal relationships. Lived childhoods reconsiders ensconced social development models of children to suggest that the situatedness of conditioned, everyday interactions and practices form a multiplicity of experiences for children. Placing these theories in conversation enables us to explore opportunities for relationships to flourish between people living with dementia in long-term care and children.
