Stories and metaphors: Talking about the past in a psychotherapy group for people with dementia

Social constructionist approaches to the talk of older adults diagnosed as suffering from a dementing illness have emphasised the importance of analysing such talk in terms of its social function. Drawing on this work together with the increasing clinical impetus towards the development of psychotherapy in this area, this paper examines two sequences of stories produced during a psychotherapy group. These stories are seen as having two related functions: first, they enable individuals to explore the significance of their experiences and thus, it is argued, act as metaphors for the personal experience of having a dementing illness; and secondly they act as a means of creating a series of social identities. As such they serve as explanations of 'what it is to lose one's mind) (Sutton 1994).