Chris – This is Me

Hello, this is Chris Norris here, let’s chat a little bit about me. I’m married with two grown-up children and we live in Ashford, Kent. I’m now 64 years old and I was diagnosed with frontal temporal dementia in December 2012 when I was 58 years old. In my working life I have been a musician in the army in Her Majesty’s Lifeguards Mounted Band where I had to be able to play my instruments while mounted on a horse. Now that’s not an easy task! Next I was a village policeman with the Kent police and on my retirement I became a driving instructor. I finished off my working life as a driving examiner for cars, tractors and taxis. My frontal temporal dementia forced me to retire from work 5 years before I intended to do so. I’m very involved with music-making and most weekends I can be found playing on a bandstand somewhere in Kent or further afield. I spend a lot of time presenting to various groups, both within the NHS and in the public arena around the subject of what it’s like living with young onset dementia. I try to remove the stigma of misunderstanding around the condition and I’m a member of a number of pro-active groups getting the true message out there. In a nutshell, that’s me. Thanks for listening. Bye now.