Exploring the relationship of couples living with dementia and the role of couples therapy; a thematic analysis

Winter, Beth

Abstract

Contemporary dementia care is starting to adopt a relationship-centred approach, recognising the wider social context of the person living with dementia. Psychological therapy offered to people living with dementia is limited and further hindered by a gap in the literature about how patients experience therapeutic interventions. The Tavistock Centre for Couple Relationships (TCCR) in London have developed a couples intervention for partners living with dementia: Living Together with Dementia (LTwD). This thesis explores the experiences of couples living with dementia and the role of LTwD in their lives. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with six couples and three carers living with dementia in London and Bristol. Interview transcripts were analysed using thematic analysis following the steps outlined by Braun and Clarke (2013) within a qualitative paradigm and a critical realist framework. Four themes were generated from the data. The first three themes serve to provide context, highlighting how the condition affected the person living with dementia, the carer, and the relationship between the couple. The final theme, ‘Port in a storm’ illustrates how therapy was experienced by each element of this triadic system, presenting the novel data in this thesis. This theme is further elaborated within three sub-themes, ‘Reconnecting with the self’, ‘Containing the container’ and ‘Living together well’. This study has implications for how services and practitioners engage with couples living with dementia, and how counselling psychology is well placed to work with and champion this marginalised group.

• Thesis Type: Thesis
• Deposit Date: Nov 28, 2019
• Publicly Available Date: Jun 29, 2020
• Public URL: https://uwe-repository.worktribe.com/output/4748157
• Award Date: Jun 29, 2020