Two brothers watched their father fade away after a Dementia diagnosis which left them feeling helpless; now they want to educate others to help!
Johannesburg, South Africa – In August last year, Lyle Anderson and his brother lost their father to dementia at the young age of 65. Lyle said it was a tough ending to his life and that he went pretty fast. The loss of his father hit Lyle hard as he didn’t take as many opportunities to see his dad.
“He lived on my brother’s farm in the Natal Midlands at the end and I was up in Joburg. I went to visit a few times and I kept thinking there’s plenty time to go see him, so it was always next week I’ll go see him and then the worst happened, he passed away. I was devastated and very angry with myself for not using the time I had left with him better.
So this got me thinking that I needed to do something to firstly make up for being a “bad son” and then to try to avoid this from happening to others like me. So my brother and I came up with something crazy.”
Lyle and his brother Struan Anderson have decided to honour their father by raising awareness about Dementia and Alzheimers. To do so, they are cycling from the Beit Bridge Border, by Zimbabwe to Cape Town but this trip is not a first for the family, Jonathan, their late father, made a very similar trip when he was seventeen.
“So this is what we thought would be the best way to honour our Dad and then use a similar ride to bring awareness around this horrible disease dementia. Awareness in the form of teaching people the early signs and allowing them to have the affected person diagnosed at an early stage. This, then allows the affected person to be part of the conversation about their future and not a burden on the family members who will be caring for them. It will also teach the affected family members the importance of the time they have left before the mind goes, not making the mistake I did.”
Their trip was to be a total of 2200km spread over 14 days. Lyle told Good Things Guy that while many sporty men could easily do this trek within the allotted time, he has not been on a bicycle since primary school and carried a fair amount of weight. The training helped him get his own health back on track.
The guys set the challenge to raise money to train caregivers working with Alzheimers SA. Initially they hoped to raise enough to train a handful or so of new carers, but in the end, they raised enough to train 80 new carers for Alzheimers SA.
“We have partnered with Alzheimer SA and they train nurses and caregivers in rural towns where they are badly needed. It costs R2500 per caregivers training and in small towns if you get dementia and it’s not spotted the community often beats that person because they believe they have an evil spirit, so it’s a worthy cause!”
They made it all the way from Zimbabwe to Cape Town without many hiccups. Just a fall here and there and the moment they thought their bikes had been stolen just as they were about to finish the challenge.
Take a look at the documentary that was filmed throughout their challenge below.
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