Taking care of our memories
To Fatima, the Walk is a way of honouring the family she’s lost and the memories she still holds of them.
Honouring family and showing support
Fatima Tumang remembers the first time she recognized dementia in her life. As a child, she spent time in the homes of family members living with the disease, watching the way things gradually shifted for them.
At first, these noticeable changes were explained away as signs of aging, but eventually those explanations no longer fit. This experience stayed with her long before she even had a name for it.
Her early experiences with dementia were part of what made the IG Wealth Management Walk for Alzheimer’s feel meaningful when she got involved in 2014. At the time, she was looking for an activity for her church community and helped organize a team.
She threw herself into it, going so far as to produce segments about the Walk that aired on Philippine television, raising awareness about dementia with audiences back home. It was a cause worth showing up for.
Over the years, the Walk took on a greater, personal meaning to Fatima — a way of honouring the family she’d lost and the memories she still holds of them.
“I’m walking for them, because they’re not here with us anymore,” she says. “I only have their memories with me.”
Last year, her team walked under the name, “Take Care of Our Memories,” which came from that same place. For Fatima, memory isn’t just a background function of daily life. “It’s the thing that holds people together across distance, time and loss,” she says.
“Our memories deserve to be cherished.”
When the Walk returned in person after the pandemic, she brought her family for the first time. Her kids were young and experienced the whole day at face value — the crowd, the colours, the cheering at the finish line — and watching them take it all in gave her a new way of seeing something she’d been part of for nearly ten years.
“They see everything,” she says. “What feels normal to me is extraordinary to them.”
Fatima wants her children to grow up knowing what it feels like to show up for other people. She hopes they understand that the ability to offer support is something you shouldn’t take for granted because there may be times in life when you’re the one who needs someone walking beside you.
Fatima is excited to attend the Winnipeg Walk again this year alongside her family. She encourages anyone who hasn’t experienced the Walk before to participate and join over a thousand others in supporting families impacted by dementia.
