ALZ AUTHORS: A Decade of Stories that Change Culture

This episode launches Season 10 of Love Conquers Alz 🎙️! And fittingly, we’re celebrating the 10th anniversary of Alz Authors, the global community changing the dementia narrative one book at a time.  My co-host,  Don Priess and I sit down with Marianne Sciucco and Christy Byrne Yates to reflect on a decade of impact — from books to podcasts to their brand-new film festival.

What began as a one-month blog has grown into a worldwide network of 400+ storytellers sharing authentic experiences of Alzheimer’s and dementia. Together we explore:

• How one story can change a life, and how hundreds can change a culture.
• Why storytelling across genres — memoir, fiction, children’s books, podcasts, and film — matters.
• The importance of curating authentic voices and supporting new authors.
• Practical encouragement for anyone ready to share their journey.

This milestone episode is a joyful reminder that storytelling is activism — and that love, creativity, and community truly Conquer Alz!

Marianne Sciucco (RN, author of Blue Hydrangeas) and Christy Byrne Yates (MS, psychologist and author of Building a Legacy of Love) co-host the AlzAuthors Podcast and bring lived caregiving wisdom to a global community of 400+ storytellers. AlzAuthors curates books, podcasts, and now films that transform the way we understand Alzheimer’s and dementia.

🎙️ Guest & Organization Contacts

Marianne Sciucco — Co-founder, AlzAuthors; author of Blue Hydrangeas
🌐 mariannesciucco.com
📱 Instagram: @mariannesciucco

📘 Facebook: Marianne Sciucco

Christy Byrne Yates, MS — Licensed Educational Psychologist; author of Building a Legacy of Love
🌐 christyyates.com

📱 Instagram: @christybyates

📘 Facebook: Christy Byrne Yates

AlzAuthors — Global community of Alzheimer’s & dementia storytellers
🌐 alzauthors.com

✉️ alzauthors@gmail.com

🎧 AlzAuthors Podcast

Chapters

• 0:00 Love Conquers Alzheimer's Introduction
• 6:58 Meeting the Alls Authors Team
• 16:17 The Birth of a Literary Movement
• 24:24 Curating Quality Dementia Literature
• 34:08 Announcing the Dementia Film Festival
• 41:53 Children and Alzheimer's: The Value of Exposure
• 48:33 10th Anniversary Celebrations and Resources

Transcript

Don Priess: 0:00

When the world has got you down, Alzheimer's sucks. It's an equal opportunity disease that chips away at everything we hold dear. And to date, there's no cure. So until there is, we continue to fight with the most powerful tool in our arsenal, love. This is Love conquers alls a real and really positive podcast that takes a deep dive into everything, Alzheimer's, The Good, the Bad, and everything in between. And now here are your hosts, Suzi, singer Carter and me. Don Priess,

Susie Singer Carter: 0:40

hello, everybody. I'm Susie singer Carter, and

Don Priess: 0:43

I'm Don Priess, and this is love conquers all. Hello, Susan

Unknown: 0:48

Donald, hello. How are you? I'm swell, and yourself.

Don Priess: 0:53

Yes, yes, I am. I am me, yes, I am.

Susie Singer Carter: 0:58

Wow,

Don Priess: 0:59

yeah. What's happening.

Susie Singer Carter: 1:01

I think, I think you need some rest, is what I think. I don't know I do. Yeah, me too. Me too. So

Don Priess: 1:10

going to bed at 330 in the morning, thing every morning, and having coffee at two in the morning, I think that's a bad idea. I

Susie Singer Carter: 1:17

don't know. Yeah, it's, it may be, but it's just a pattern we're in now, ever since working and moving, this is what we do. We are, I we drink a lot of caffeine, and we're so hyped up, like, like, we're hopped up on, not Benny's, but on caffeine,

Don Priess: 1:37

yeah, and dinner, which we eat at, you know, midnight. So you know,

Susie Singer Carter: 1:41

this is the life of pretty filmmakers. We can't help it. It is never ending. But the good thing is, is that our documentaries Coming out August 1, No Country for Old people, is going to be a three part series, Docu series, and starts on August 1. And we really would love everybody to go to Amazon, stream it, watch it, and if you like it, review it, so that other people will get a chance to get that on their radar. Because everybody needs to know all the information that's in this documentary. It's so, so important. And we spent quite a quite a lot of sweat equity into this to to really expose what's going on so that maybe we can protect others from going through what others have already gone through and are going through right now, which is not pleasant. The opposite.

Don Priess: 2:40

I was thinking that it took, it's taken us over three years to get to this point. And you think of all the the suffering that's been going on during those three years every day, yeah, and it's, you know, and between now and the time it actually airs on August 1, how much more will be. And that's why this is so important, and why we need to get this message out and make change and make it now, because it's just too many people are are falling to the to the system, and

Unknown: 3:13

yes, we changed and

Susie Singer Carter: 3:15

now, and our system may be even getting worse, if that, if that's even possible. So you know we have to prepare for first that as well. And it's a, it's a, it's a poop show, sometimes, sometimes life. But you know what the good thing is, is that we know that, you know we, we are launching a movement called roar. And you can go to our website, at No Country for Old people.com. And you can check it out. It stands for respect, oversight, advocacy and reform for long term care. It's it's a way to activate and and galvanize our public and our collective to to really speak out and be a voice for the voiceless. And we do know that it might seem hopeless, but it's not because everything that seemed hopeless before our me too, movement, our Black Lives Matter, our LGBTQ, all these movements required a collective voice, and that collective voice cannot be ignored. It just can't so it's very important that we pull together as a community again, because we can't do it. We can't rely on people who, you know, who have been, actually, there's been so many people who have been Tyler, tirelessly advocating, and it doesn't work. Traditional advocacy doesn't work in these, you know, situations that are subsidized by lots of money. So, you know, but we are more powerful than that. That is our current. We are the

Don Priess: 4:44

current. And it's truly, yeah, it's truly a collective too. It has nothing to do with what side of the aisle you stand on, whether you're right left. It does. The system doesn't care. And, you know, frankly, aging doesn't care where you stand.

Unknown: 5:00

Opportunity that's everything Yes, absolutely is and, and so let's all do it together.

Susie Singer Carter: 5:07

Do it together. Yes, and, and, you know, is that a good segue into our guests that we are going to invite on? I'm very

Don Priess: 5:16

to find out we can try that and see if it is a good try that,

Susie Singer Carter: 5:19

because we have, we have a very well. This is one of our guests. This is going to be her third time on on Love conquers halls and but it's a very special occasion and such an amazing resource. I'm not going to give it away. You give you, you introduce and then we'll, and then we'll we'll love them up. We'll give them a lot of love, because we love them.

Don Priess: 5:45

Sounds good to me. Today's episode is a celebration, not just of an extraordinary milestone, but of a movement. We are joined by two remarkable women from all authors the global community of authors writing about Alzheimer's and dementia, where it is said, one story can change a life. Hundreds can change a culture. Mary Ann Shuko is a registered nurse, author of numerous books, including blue hydrangeas, an Alzheimer's love story, and a founding member of all authors. She turned her decades of dementia care into powerful storytelling, then live the story herself, caring for both her parents. Joining her is Christy Byrne Yates, a licensed educational psychologist, author and coach in building a legacy of love. She shares her experience caring for her parents while raising her own children, truly living the sandwich generation life, Christy and Marianne blend lived wisdom with professional insight. CO hosting the all's authors podcast, and today they're here to talk about the all's authors 10th anniversary and their upcoming film festival. So without further ado, let's say hello to Mary Ann Shuko and Christy Byrne Yates, Hello,

Susie Singer Carter: 7:00

Mary Ann and Christy. Welcome, welcome, welcome.

Unknown: 7:07

Thank you for all those kind words.

Susie Singer Carter: 7:10

You deserve it. You deserve it. 10 years is a milestone.

Marianne Sciucco: 7:16

I know it's only supposed to be for one month,

Susie Singer Carter: 7:21

right? You're a pioneer. Because we started love conquers all at the end of 2019 right, before covid. And I feel like five years has been, you know, almost six years we're, it's, it's like, how did we last? You know, and you're going 10 years is like, You're that. That's like trailblazing. You were trailblazing back then, right? Yeah, it all gets started.

Marianne Sciucco: 7:49

I had this idea of trying to connect other authors of books on Alzheimer's and dementia to help cross promote one another. It was not a altruistic endeavor at first, it's like, let's see if we can get, you know, some people to pay attention to us. So we embarked on a one month program. There were five of us at the time, and three of us really clicked and enjoyed what we were doing. We were blogging for each other and sharing social media posts and things like that. Back in 2015 and then we got back together a year later and said, Why don't we start a blog, and instead of talking about our books, we'll invite other people to talk about their books. So we didn't know what would happen. We thought, well, is anybody going to want to write a blog post for us? Because nobody knows who we are. So we said, well, we'll give it a try. It was for June. We needed 20 blog posts. We had did one a day, Monday to Friday each week, and at the end of the month we had, we still had blog posts coming in. So we said, well, what are we going to do with this? Well, we'll just keep it going. We'll see what happens. And here we are,

Susie Singer Carter: 8:55

amazing. And it always boggles my mind, because, you know, it's like when I did my mom and the girl of my short film, I thought people were encouraging me do a film on Alzheimer's. I was like, what, just what the world needs is another film on Alzheimer's, right? And then I was, I really stand corrected, because people do need the more stories the better, right? And so, you know, you think about, oh, here you are. Like, I don't know how many books and authors you've had on your how many? How many have you written? 400 400 so. And those are people that have written some, many of them, multiple books, right? Yeah. And so, when you write and so, you think about how many stories there are, but, but we can't have enough stories. Isn't that? Right? Don't you think, right?

Marianne Sciucco: 9:41

No, with all of these stories that people still don't know anything about this disease, we we need more stories, and we need them coming from other places around the world, and other voices too.

Don Priess: 9:54

And Christy, how did you become involved in the in in this amazing venture?

Unknown: 9:59

Yeah. Know, I am just I bask in the the wisdom of these, these women who started this program, and Mary Ann found me, contacted me, I guess she found my book, or someone referred it to her. They were looking. Yeah, they were looking anyway. So she asked me if I'd be interested, and I was very interested. I was a self published author, but I had a story to tell and and I just, I have to tell you, it was very cool to be a part of it. But it was shortly after, this is in 2021 when I published my book. And then shortly after that, Marianne contacted me, and it wasn't too long after that that they did a poetry reading online, and I attended that, and I was blown away. I was blown away by the quality of poets, that all of these people were telling stories, heartfelt stories, and I just said, Hey, I want to do more with you guys. Tell me I had recently taken early retirement after working 20 years in the school system as a school psychologist, and really wanted to focus on supporting people in the sandwich generation. And I said, What can I do? I'm a volunteer because I have helium hands right? Whenever somebody says, hey, we need somebody to do something. My hand just shoots up. I don't even have any control over it. But I jumped in.

Susie Singer Carter: 11:27

Mental note.

Unknown: 11:30

I jumped in, and I have enjoyed it so much. And so it's so impressive what they've done in, you know, really, 10 short years, and just the quality of authors that are there, but also podcasters and storytellers and filmmakers like yourself. Susie, it was just so incredible. And so we're just very excited about this 10 year anniversary. And I love hearing Mary Ann tell the story, and any of the founders tell the story about how they found each other, kind of like, who knew, who knew this was going to happen? So it's

Susie Singer Carter: 12:03

really, right, right? Really wonderful. So how

Don Priess: 12:07

different is the Oh, I was going to just say, how different is the landscape? Do you feel in awareness, knowledge, public knowledge, of Alzheimer's, but not only just Alzheimer's, the disease, but how it affects everyone? How different is it now than it was when you started 10 years ago?

Susie Singer Carter: 12:23

Yeah,

Marianne Sciucco: 12:24

I think that there's, you know, because of so much more being shared, people aren't afraid to talk about it. When I first published my book, people didn't want to even know about it, and thought that it was terrible to write a book about Alzheimer's, and there weren't that many books available. While I was writing it, I tried to do research, and I was looking for memoirs and novels, and there wasn't much out there. But now, I mean, there's new books coming out every week, and we have been inundated with requests for people that want to be part of all those authors. And you know, people come to our events. The podcast has got excellent downloads. We know that people are listening. We know that people are reading. And it, I think it's a big change from 10 years, or even 15 or so years, you know, from when I when I started with writing the book.

Susie Singer Carter: 13:16

I think it's such a great niche, because I think it was, it's such a great niche that you guys have carved out, because you you have become the preeminent destination for people with these with books on dementia and Alzheimer's and caregiving, because and that that you know that was an that was not there before you and and You bring a quality the the way that you curate these, these, you know, books, you curate them with a sense of quality and and, you know, discern. And so when people do read a book that's recommended by you, by all authors, we know it's going to be good. And that's very that's that's incredible, because nobody has time to waste on something that's that's written poorly. It's like films, the same thing I, you know, I was invited to go to film because I we did an Alzheimer's film, and we'd go and watch some of these films and wonder, how did they ever get made? They're so destructive, they're not they're not productive, you know, yeah.

Don Priess: 14:16

And then how did they even get chosen for the festivals? You know, there was, it seemed there was, there was no, it's just, oh, here it exists. So therefore we'll put it in that's not exactly but because it exists doesn't mean that it

Susie Singer Carter: 14:30

right. You raise the bar. And that's important, because that information is is incredibly important, information that needs to be accurate.

Unknown: 14:41

And I want to say, I think what's really cool and very unique and necessary is that there are so many genre of books and art forms represented that are part of the Al's authors families. There are children's books, right? How to talk to children of. About someone who has dementia. I come from working in schools, and I know that learning how to tell children about things like what's going on with Grandma, what's going on with Grandpa, or what have you, that's so important. And then we have books written from people who are currently experiencing and living with some form of dementia, that's hugely powerful, because it's just a beautiful road map like the and they're vital really wonderful writers, and it's just it's great for people to see this, because we're also dispelling and and kind of shattering some of the stereotypes that are out there and under people are seeing a different side and that there's life after a diagnosis, and how do we live a great life with that? So I think it's really important to see all these different kinds of books and art forms told from many different stories. Fiction books are fabulous because we can relate to them a little differently. So it's all genre, right? So I think that's really important to point out.

Susie Singer Carter: 16:05

I love that I like and I do think fiction is great too, right? You know, because it didn't you, you can guide it and and, you know, with the knowledge that you have, it's so important. And I see it in films all the time. I actually get angry when I watch something that's lauded. I won't mention certain things, but there's been so many films that have been lauded, and you think it's only they're lauded because there haven't been enough, and because they're really inaccurate, and they're really, you know, misrepresenting and are and they're just not accurate. And so it sets up a false kind of bar. If you haven't gone through it yet. So you know, it can be very disappointing. So I think it's so important to have that accuracy and and finesse with how you curate and what gets chosen, what I know Mary and I you've spoken about that before on our other podcasts about how you curate, curate and what gets chosen and what doesn't right?

Marianne Sciucco: 17:04

Yeah, and we've grown, like, even stricter than we only started, you know, we would kind of, you know, we we give the authors the benefit of the of the doubt. We were doing a book a week, and now we're doing a book a month, so we only have 12 spots a year. So we have to be even more discerning, so every book is vetted by one of the acquisitions authors. All of them have cared for a parent, primarily a parent or parents with dementia, but also have written their own books so they know what a good book is supposed to be like, and they read the books from, you know, cover to cover, and corresponding with the authors. And then the authors have to meet another certain set of criteria. They have to have an active social media presence, and, you know, they have to be out there working their own book as well. And they have to have a certain number of reviews. And we take about 60 of the books that come our way, and one of the things that we did was this year when we went down to 12 books because we were still getting books that we would like to feature, but they kind of just didn't, weren't 100% so we started a new thing called the recommended reads. So we will put books in that category. There's a category on the website just for that. So it's kind of small right now. We haven't really, yeah, we haven't expanded on it too much, but we were getting so many books, we were backed up by like, six months. And, yeah, we were uncomfortable with that, because the authors would be so excited, and then to find out they had to wait six months to see their book on all authors, and by then they would have lost their enthusiasm. So we decided, you know, this was one way to, kind of, like, fine tune it even more. And then in the past, for like, the first, you know, nine years, eight or nine years, we didn't charge any fees. And so then we had to impose a fee, but they get a lot. Okay, they get a lot for their their money. They they every new author who comes in gets podcast. They're on the podcast, and they get to sit on the homepage for a month as the featured author of the month. And we you know they're in the newsletter. They get twice in the newsletter, they get a social media blast. They may be invited to some of our virtual events, depending on what we're talking about. So, you know, they we give a lot for that. We believe that it's, you know, money well spent. Generally, yeah, they're on the right side for people looking for that. Yeah,

Susie Singer Carter: 19:39

absolutely, because I, yeah, because my mom was diagnosed in her, like, I want, what was it? 2009 ish around that time, and I, first of all, there was no podcast about it. There was barely any books. I think I had. The only book I read was Greg O'Brien's right? And that was, you know, and. I it was so raw that I couldn't even, like, get through it, because it was very disturbing, right? I wasn't ready for that information. Gregor write it. Wrote a memoir basically about his Alzheimer's journey. And he's an incredible journalist and incredible writer, and I actually got had the chance to interview him all these years later, but, and he was just a delightful human being, but that there wasn't much to go, you know, there wasn't a lot of information, right? So you guys, and I can tell you that I've had so many authors come to me and go. So, you know, all authors, can you give us an introduction? And I say, Well, yeah, that's not my I won't do it. If I don't know the book, I will not you know, can

Don Priess: 20:48

you tell where somebody's coming from? Because what we've noticed now is the space has become very cluttered with maybe some people who aren't in it for the right reason, who are in it because they see it as an opportunity to make a few bucks here and there. And, you know, you see it in some of the podcasts, you see it in social media. You see people who are out there for the wrong reasons. Can you sense that? Have you run into that as people submit their

Unknown: 21:17

their books? Yeah, we do. I think so. I think so, and, and, you know, we are definitely about, like we say, lighting the way for others. And it's not just the caregivers. It's also people who are experiencing and living with some form of dementia, but but also just a big caring heart for the caregivers, because the impact on the family is huge, and it's, it's, it lasts for a long time, and it changes who we are. I mean, Susie, you probably have experienced that. It changes who you are. And so we want to be able to show the love, the compassion, as well as the struggle, right? So I think we're looking always for people who are, are in it for the right reasons, too. So I think that's really smart. Don you're at You're right. I mean, there are some folks who might not be, that might not be where they're going, but I think all, I think Mary Ann just said it. You know, we're all of us in the not just the acquisitions team, but everybody who's a volunteer at Al's authors has been touched by this, and so we're definitely coming from a place of love for people and and caring about where we're going so

Susie Singer Carter: 22:37

and understanding, understanding experience. That's that's key, right? It's key with something like this, because, still, our our medical industry doesn't really have a lot, you know, they're very uninformed, for the most part, about dementia and Alzheimer's, so they're really not a resource for most of us, you know, when someone gets a you know they're getting a diagnosis, and you're given, like, maybe a pamphlet, maybe,

Don Priess: 23:09

and a couple of drugs and and there you go, yeah,

Unknown: 23:13

come back next year.

Susie Singer Carter: 23:15

Yeah. And it's, it's very frightening. It's scary. It's beyond scary. And so you're left to your own devices, and trying to figure out, navigate it is just incredibly hard. So, yeah, Don and I have have seen the industry like, as you have grow and grow and grow. You know, we've heard that, you know, the 5 million caregiver staff, like, thrown around like, you know, to like the hungry wolves, and we are so worried about that, because it's important that you keep it, you know, safe and and and authentic. So, but you guys are doing a great job at that, obviously, of and we're lots of respect for you for that. How, how, how? So we talked about people who have stories, and there's so many stories, but there's always room for more stories, because everybody's everybody has just a little bit more story, right, a different story that might resonate with another person, that might just hit them right where they live. So what if someone's never been an author? What do you recommend? How do they start?

Unknown: 24:24

Oh, that's a that is a great question. You

Marianne Sciucco: 24:26

just start writing, because when you start in, what you have, you know, by the time you think you get to the end, you're gonna have to put it, redo, the whole thing all over. Anyway, then you might discover your beginning is in the latter half of the book. And then you might discover that there's much of it that you need to just delete. So the most important thing is to start writing. Because you can't edit an empty page, a blank page, you need to have, you know, stop putting things down if you saved you. If you kept a diary or a journal, if you have correspondence, emails, letters, text messages, whatever you have throughout that journey, you can turn that into resources for for your story, to help juggle your memory so that you can put things into order and and figure it all out. So you know, you just need to get started, and it's going to be a long process. It's going to be like, you know, your movie, it's going to take years, and you're going to be have to restart again and figure it all out over and over again, and you do about 20 drafts before you really even done. And

Don Priess: 25:38

is that specific guidance that you are. Is that something that you offer somebody, if you see promise in a book, you say, wow, there's a lot here, but it's not a book. Is that something that that you do

Unknown: 25:52

some of us have, yeah, I think, right? Mary Ann, we sometimes, I mean, some of our acquisitions editors, right, have read a book and said, You know, it's not, here's some things that we would note, and if you kind of look at this, maybe make some changes. It could just be finding a really great line editor or and it doesn't have to be super expensive, you know, there are a lot of ways to get the writing coaching you might need, but so yeah, we would definitely do that because we wanted you. We want our authors work to be to represent them well too, right? So that's important. And I think, you know, we're kind of entering a weird place, right? And I don't know how you all, you both see this too, but in the advent of AI, the temptation is to just do it that way. And I would, I would caution people and say, right from your authentic place, because that's where we're going to find heart, and we're going to find something beautiful sometimes, you know, we do have some books that are written by people who have a medical background, and so we're just looking for, are they presenting things in a readable way, but also not making promises for A final cure or something, right? May not be truly accurate, so we want to be careful about that, but

Susie Singer Carter: 27:28

those are some things. Yeah, I think of that. It's a great point that you bring up about AI, because you know as writer, and I've been a writer my whole career, and I feel like, you know, what is that? What is, how does that impact us as as writers? Because, you know, I wouldn't use AI to write, although I am not opposed to it helping me, you know, draft a post for for the internet. That's that's helpful. I have to say, I have never, not edited it, because it's never like my voice, and it's never exactly human, and you know, and it just and it always sounds derivative, but it gets you started if you're in a hurry for sure, right? Yeah, I

Unknown: 28:16

think it's totally legit for things like a post or something on your website kind of thing, to punch it up or make it clear or concise, right? Yeah. And I definitely think it can be a great first draft. Who was it? And Lamont, that's your can I say the word is that the shitty first draft? I mean, that's what

Susie Singer Carter: 28:39

I read that book, read that book, Yep, yeah,

Unknown: 28:42

yeah. So maybe that's where that comes from. But yes, you can go back and edit and but there are, and we do have for authors that we've accepted. We have a Facebook group for our authors who want to continue to hone their craft, and so we try to engage as much as we can in there too, so,

Marianne Sciucco: 29:01

and we've done workshops too. We just, we do workshops a lot of the time. It's more on marketing. They've already written a book. So, yeah, they've already written the book. So now we try to do workshops with them to show help them get it out there. And that's

Susie Singer Carter: 29:18

so great, because, you know, how many people can get a publishing deal? Most people, especially on a niche topic like Alzheimer's, they're going to probably end up self publishing Correct. A

Marianne Sciucco: 29:33

lot of them are published or small presses. But even with a small press, they only market you for a brief time, a few months, and then you're on your own. So they are and, you know, I always say marketing is a degree in college. You get a bachelor's. So just because you've got a book and you take go to a few webinars and read some blog posts, you're not gonna know how to market your book. I mean, it's a it's a lot,

Susie Singer Carter: 29:59

it's.

Don Priess: 30:00

Worst environment. It's ever changing. It's ever changing too because of the technology, the way in the landscape is completely different now than it was two three years ago.

Susie Singer Carter: 30:11

Same as a movie, same as a movie like it used to you'd go to Rotten Tomatoes. Rotten Tomatoes is like yesterday's news now. Now it's what is it? Don letter box.

Unknown: 30:22

Letter box. Yeah, I haven't even heard of that one.

Susie Singer Carter: 30:25

No, yeah, that's the one. Now we have to that's the one. So now we have to acquaint ourselves, yeah,

Don Priess: 30:32

are there other than just books or in poetry? Are there other mediums that come into play, ie, music, film, you know that that it's as becoming part of the alls authors, universe

Marianne Sciucco: 30:47

festival, right? Some of the authors, that's what they do. They do artwork where they work with people with dementia, and do art workshops and things where we're doing a book right now. It's called, it's a six word memoir book. Are you familiar with the six word memoirs? You write your stories using six words? Yeah. So we put out a call to people on the six words website to tell us their dementia story in six words. And so we got, like, a lot. So I said, why don we make a book? And we we put out a call to some of the authors that we know work with art in with people with dementia, and ask them, Do you have any any artwork you could share for this book? And they they've said, Oh, yeah. They we have, like, four people that are going to participate

Susie Singer Carter: 31:34

already. What give us one of the memoirs? Can you share one memoir of the six word memoir?

Marianne Sciucco: 31:41

I'll share the one that was the first one I ever heard, which was from Susan Cushman, one of our authors. And she did not have a good relationship with her mother, and they were estranged for many, many years, but she stepped up to care for her when her mother had Alzheimer's, and this is what she said, The upside to Alzheimer's new mother, because her mother forgot what it was that bothered her about her daughter, and the two of them became best friends, and at the end of her mother's life, they were very close, had a loving relationship. So

Susie Singer Carter: 32:13

isn't that incredible?

Marianne Sciucco: 32:16

Yeah, and that's not the only one. We have other authors in our organization who have had the same experience, yeah, caring for somebody that they didn't get. You know, they had a turbulent relationship with, right?

Unknown: 32:31

Marianne, don't? We have some folks who are podcasters and maybe, maybe they've written something as well, but they their primary position is that they do podcasting, and they are putting out information around Alzheimer Alzheimer's dementia caregiving, and so they're part of our oz authors family. And yeah, like Lance Latin. Yeah, Lance Latin.

Marianne Sciucco: 32:58

Well, it all come down to we want to give people like a lot of different media to choose from. Maybe they don't like to read, they don't have time, they don't want to sit down listen to read a book. It's hard when you're a caregiver, when you're reading a book, that's what you're doing. You aren't doing anything else. Your hands are occupied. Guys are occupied. What? What can you do? Well, you can listen to an audio book, or you can listen to a podcast. So we provide the podcast. You maybe you don't like books at all. You just prefer to watch a film, a documentary, or even, you know, just a story. So we try to find those and, you know, they're obscure things. I mean, people like, you know, Hollywood and stuff. They don't they don't need us, so then they don't come but we've worked with people that are like struggling to find, you know, viewers Well, listeners or readers. So that's kind of what we do. So the film festival been wanting to do it for a while, talking about it for over a year, I think, and we have right now five films that we're going to present. It may, may turn out to be only four, but that's okay, and we're going to do it in the fall. It starts in September, runs through December. And how we're going to work it is that you you will get a link to watch the movie at your own convenience a week or so before we gather together online to have a discussion with the creators. And then you'll have, you know, be able to talk and talk to them and learn more about it and share stories and all that. And then everything we do is recorded, so now we have content for our podcast, and we have content for our YouTube channel, so people can again, watch on YouTube if they want, or listen to it on the go, on a podcast, and those people that maybe didn't make the meeting or didn't know about it, you know, a year from now, and say, Well, what's this all about? And then they can go look for the movie as well. Well. So we have you, Susie Yes, presenting the first hour of No Country for Old people. So we're thrilled about that. And then we have Mary Crescenzo, who did the quote of play. Her play is, it was called Planet a and she is a person who has spent most of her life working with people with dementia, using the arts, music, dance, artwork. She's an artist. She's multimedia, very talented, and she's a phenomenal writer. So she had written this play, and they filmed it, and it's kind of unusual. When I first started to watch her, I was kind of like, what is this? But is this? But the writing was just so beautiful that I just couldn't stop listening to it. And it was just her, like her friends in the Acting Program, reading the script, and each one was in character, telling a different part of the story from dementia, like whether it was the person who had the dementia, or it was their daughter, or whoever it was, it was very compelling. We have Frank Silverstein, who did a short film called lousy loving the time of dementia, about caring for both of his parents who had dementia at the same time. That was very trending, as you can imagine. And then see Nathan Brown, who is with exposed dementia, and his movie is called the present, and it's a Christmas story, and it's about a family dealing with the aftermath of the loss of the mother to Alzheimer's, and now it's the holidays and how they're handling that. And kitty Norton wine women and dementia, we're hoping that she'll be joining us. We got our fingers crossed, because hers is a great film, and I love her whole story because I love RVing, and when she was on her journey, she was one of our authors early On, and that was with her blog, lickety Glitz I think that was, yeah,

Susie Singer Carter: 37:04

it was cool, yeah. And so was it splits. Lickety splits. I

Marianne Sciucco: 37:07

think it was Blitz. Look at he splits. Anyway. She kept the blog, and she developed a big audience of caregivers, other women. So when her journey ended, she got in an RV and she traveled all across the country, United States, to meet these women, and they filmed it in their discussions, and they're talking about caregivers, and they're having a glass of wine, and it's funny, and it's just delightful. So she's had a lot of success with that. She's doing really well, so we hope that kitty will be a part of it. So that's what we're doing. And I've just like, I've learned about two other things since we started this, but I think we're gonna cap it at

Unknown: 37:45

that Mariana just means that next year we have to make this an annual event. Okay, we're just giving ourselves more work. Let's be honest, you and I are gonna be at this again. So, yeah, we hope

Marianne Sciucco: 37:54

is successful. We did one with the movie called Keys, bags, names, words, which was from the UK, and that was very impactful, and that had a lot to do with dementia in the arts, and was with that was, you know, we tried that format watch the movie when you can, you know, caregivers don't have time to sit at the front of the screen two o'clock on Tuesday, so we watch it and then come back in and we'll Talk about it. So that seemed to work really well.

Susie Singer Carter: 38:23

Looks like a book club. You read it first, yeah? You get together, right? Yeah, exactly, yeah. I

Marianne Sciucco: 38:29

don't like, I don't like streaming videos and movies on these zoom calls and things, because they always get messed up.

Don Priess: 38:38

They're free. Yeah? They're doing, Oh, it's terrible,

Susie Singer Carter: 38:41

yeah, crash, it's hard. We've done a lot of we've done a lot,

Unknown: 38:44

yeah, can't do it. So that's why we said, let's not do that. Yeah? So, you know,

Susie Singer Carter: 38:49

it's tricky. Oh, my god, yeah. I mean, we lament over every second of every frame, and then, then you've got it up there going,

Don Priess: 38:57

and you don't even know how people are seeing it, everyone's seeing some people, some people you have no idea. So,

Susie Singer Carter: 39:04

yeah, it's so difficult for us. We're like, we're literally flop sweating. Yeah, it's terrible. It's terrible. Yeah, so, well, I that's that's much better. That makes much more sense, and they're going to get a much better experience with the film. And so that's good. I'm interested. One other thing is a little bit, just a little left turn, but I'm interested, Christy, because you said you you work with children before, right as you and I think it's so important to introduce dementia and Alzheimer's to children as young as you can, as young as you think that they can understand it, and because I personally saw the difference between the children of the frontline providers who were there, like the CNAs and stuff, when my mom was, you know, in assisted living, and they would bring their children on the weekend. Is, and the children were so non plus about it. They were just that, you know, that's Jack. He here, Jack, here's the remote, because the Jack was getting agitated, right? And they just had no problem with it. It's like, No, you Here it is. You left it over here. Oh, you want water? Okay, hold on. And this is like a five year old going and not not getting upset, not just understanding what's going on and not disrespecting it, but just knowing that's what Jack does. Yeah, I think it's important, because in you know, and juxtaposed to that was me bringing my friend's daughter to visit my mom. I was babysitting her, and she had never been around, apparently, elder people, and she was beyond frightened, like, yeah, like, so scared. And I thought how sad that was, right? Because she's missing out and the other and the and our other generations missing out because there's so much to give each other. So, right? What do you think? I mean, yeah,

Unknown: 41:01

I feel really strongly that it's, it's, it is important to prepare kids not to to to lessen fear, and you just, it's very you can normalize this. You know, even though we know Alzheimer's is not a normal part of, you know, not everyone's going to get it on a normal pot of aging. But you know what is love is normal, compassion is normal, and children are natural. What I found working in school systems, children, you know, left to their own devices. They're just really compassionate. They get it this one over here needs a little extra time. That one over there needs a little help now and then. They don't, they don't get upset about it until someone tells them, oh, it's not fair that that child's adults kind of mess that up a little bit, right? We can, yeah, we can. Kids like you were describing, you know what they want. They want to be compassionate. It's a natural thing for them, and but if they're if they're kept away from it, right, if we are trying to protect them, that's more about our discomfort as the adult. That is comfort. Now, there may be times when a child is highly sensitive, you know, they may have their own special needs, and then we need to be aware of that and cognizant of that, and then approach that maybe a little differently, but I think it's important to always let kids be able to have that exposure, especially if it's a loved one, you know, yeah, it's so good for them. And what I also like to say to people is, you know, in care giving as a sandwich generation parent, you're training your kids about how to treat you so you know what, you acting in really compassionate, wonderful ways too. And you're not always going to sometimes you're going to show up and you're not going to be your best self. Yeah, that's okay too. You can talk about that, but it's about having those age appropriate conversations. But I agree with you. I think it's so important we think we're sheltering kids, but who we're sheltering is ourselves, and we have to check

Susie Singer Carter: 43:15

that all the time. I say that all the time, that when I thought I was, I thought I was, you know, helping my mom avoid embarrassment. But it was really mine in the beginning, that it was my embarrassment, and so I learned that. And I also learned, you know, when my mom was not doing well at the at in the nursing home, which was the, you know, instigated this documentary my granddaughter, who was two at the time, only, only met my mom, because it was during covid on Zoom once a week as a baby, when, when she finally got to see her and mom was in bed, and she just climbed right on top of the bed. I don't know if you've seen that, if you remember that Marion, it's in the it's in the trailer, but she climbed right up there, and she just got on and just patting her and petting her and saying, Nanny, Nanny, Nanny. And then looking back at her, and my mom would smile, and then my mom would go to kiss her, and the two of them would kiss and then she'd lay her head down. They talked. They had a conversation. Word, yeah, that's saying a word. We sat there as adults. We literally like, I get chills thinking about it. We literally were like, What is going on? Oh, my God, this is amazing, you know. And I had people tell me, when my mom lived with me with Alzheimer's, they said, Oh, is this fair to your daughter? My because my daughter was a teenager, are you sure you want to bring your mom? And it was like, Maybe I shouldn't. Am I doing the wrong thing? You know? And I put this in that in my short film, where, a year later, my daughter said, and it was not easy. She said, I'm not ready for nanny. Nanny to go. She was she, we. It was the best experience we could have had.

Unknown: 44:57

Yes, it is real life. Learning compassion in real time. I always say empathy in action is compassion. And so when we do that, when we allow that to happen, of course, it's going to be hard at the end, of course. And yet, that's a norm, that is we are. I mean, I happen to believe we're all going to pass away at some point. There are people who believe that that never has to happen, but I believe that it probably will, and so it's a normal thing, and we have to be able to talk about it and deal with the hard feelings and realize that we can also get through those and that love will remain. So it's really important to allow kids to just experience human emotions.

Marianne Sciucco: 45:45

We have a ton of kids books, yeah, in our collection, they're great and they're beautiful, so people can look great. And that we have like for young, very young children all the way through grade school and in young adult.

Susie Singer Carter: 45:59

I love it. I think it's so important everybody go on all authors and and look at those books, because that's so important. I read to my little granddaughters. I have a two year old, another two year old now, and if and that two year old that I was telling you about is now five. And you know, they love books. We read books and before bed every night, and I have read them books that were given to me from guests, right? And I read that to them, and they love it. They love it. And so I think, yeah, go, go to all's authors then, and look at the list of books that they have. It's, it's such a great resource. You guys are doing such an amazing thing by by aggregating all of this great content. It's just, it's, it's really a gift. It's really a gift. So I can't, I just thank you so so so much,

Don Priess: 46:50

and anything. Thank you for the 10th Anniversary. Are there any others big special events for the 10th Anniversary? Or what is it just kind of, well, we're running laid out for the year.

Marianne Sciucco: 47:02

Yeah, well, some of them we've already done. So that's, you know, we've had a few virtual events. We were doing a book club. We did that for the first half of the year. That stopped. Now, all those sessions are on our podcast and YouTube channel so people can catch up if they missed it. But we're doing a giveaway, and you can go on the site, all's authors.com and enter the giveaway. And we're giving away many custom caregiver collections, one every month. So the custom caregiver collection is a collection of books that we will curate for you, and it can be as many books as you want. There's usually about 15 in a set, but you can have as many as you want. Some people have had 30 books. Yeah, what they come they come with, like a little with bookshelves, and it's like a whole thing, and we will help you find the books that you want. So if you were just looking for books, say, I did one for a a support group where I live, and it was mainly women caring for the husband. So that was the books that we chose. You know, yeah, yeah. So we you could win a mini collection, and it's three titles, and you tell us what you are looking for if you want a caregiver guide, if you want a book about caring for your father or your your wife, whatever you're looking for, we will put that together for you. So we're giving away 12 of them. So we've already done, I think, four or five. So, yeah, go on the website and put your name in. You never know you

Susie Singer Carter: 48:36

might win. So good. That's a good deal, you guys. That's amazing. I mean, that's that is you guys. You guys so good. You do so many good things, and you're always busy, busy, busy, busy. And I, you know, I feel like I've been out of the loop for the last three years because of documentary. I feel like I I've tried to stay in touch with everybody as much as possible. But just getting our doc, just getting our our podcast done has been like, oh, because, you know, it's just been hard, and we did not want to lose I did not want to stop the podcast, because I love it so much. I love being in this community. I I love I think I still have a lot to share, and I will continue to have a lot to share. And I think, and I love talking to other people with their shares. So here we are now. We can spend a little more time with our community. And I love you. I love, love, I love. You. Know, all authors, you guys do incredible work. So thank you for sharing your 10th anniversary with us, and you keep mentioning you love Christy. We're all about love. We're all about love. That's great. Don, why are we all about love? Don

Don Priess: 49:45

you want to know why? Well, that's because love is powerful, love is contagious, and love conquers all we do. Thank everyone for watching, listening today, if you like what you heard and saw, well, just like us, share. Get. The word out there, and definitely go to all they love us. And definitely go do all's offers.com and check out what's going there, because there's a lot going

Unknown: 50:07

on and going on.

Susie Singer Carter: 50:11

We appreciate you listening to us and you're watching

Don Priess: 50:14

Absolutely yeah, and watch for no country, for old people. August 1 Amazon, on Amazon. We can't wait for everyone to see this. It's really important. And again, thank you for joining us today.

Unknown: 50:28

So thank you.

Susie Singer Carter: 50:29

Thank you so much. You're so welcome. You.