Christopher Eccleston: ‘Dementia dismantled my father’s personality’

As the devastating disease took over my father, I struggled to salvage a loving relationship, before finding a new way to enter his world – with crosswords, Shakespeare and humour

My father was a hard-working, passionate man. He was an alpha male, and captain of his sports teams: someone who stood up to be counted, and never hid away. Like everyone, he had flaws – but he loved me very deeply, and I loved him.

In 2000, he was diagnosed with vascular dementia – where blood supply to the brain becomes reduced. We are a stoical family, and that’s how we dealt with the news. As my mother would say, “You just have to get on with it.”

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