Dementia baby dolls bring meaning, joy into memory care patients’ lives: It “fills your cup”
KTVT
By Trevor Sochocki
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MCKINNEY, Texas (KTVT) — Tonja Moon walked with purpose into the lobby of Golden Grace Assisted Living in McKinney, holding the baby in the crook of her arm.
“Hey everybody,” she cooed to the residents seated on the couches and chairs. “Look what we have.”
As Moon and the other volunteers with the Grand Baby Project passed out the rest of the babies to the memory care patients, some of them caught on.
“Is she a real baby?” a resident asked.
“If you want her to be,” Moon replied.
Strictly speaking, no — the handful of baby dolls the grandparents doted on are not living. But Moon said some of her clients don’t know that.
“We just want to give them the opportunity to have purpose every single day,” Moon explained. “Dementia doll therapy is really just a way for residents to have purpose and connection.”
For the last five years, Moon and her Texas-based nonprofit have been going around the country, giving dolls to memory care units and residents. Though the practice of giving dolls to the elderly is common overseas, it was a foreign concept to Moon when she first heard about it.
She started the project after seeing how her grandma reacted.
“We literally wrapped up this tiny little doll in a nursing home towel,” Moon recalled. “She thought she’d been handed a newborn.”
The project delivered 3,000 baby dolls last year around the world. Moon equates it to pet therapy — she said it gives residents a reason to be healthy and embrace their nurturing instinct.
“Depending on where they are,” said Golden Grace Assisted Living’s Erika Brown. “They take the baby and they love on them, because it reminds them of a time where they held their own baby or their own grandbaby.”
Moon said she’s seen improved outcomes across the board due to the dolls.
“You can see the smiles yourself of how wonderful it really, truly is,” Brown said. “Even the guys, even though you don’t expect them to really get involved, they really go for it.”
The dolls at Golden Grace will stay there for the residents to take care of for the rest of their lives — and Moon will be back in a year to celebrate all the babies’ birthdays.
“Fills your cup,” Moon said. “But man, it breaks my heart every single time — in a good way.”
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