A modest experiment in brain-first training.

MemoryDialog. I have been sitting on this domain name for nearly ten years, hoping to begin a conversation with others like me — professionals who noticed memory problems while still in the midst of otherwise successful careers.

A lot has happened in those ten years: professional upheaval, medical diagnoses, health maintenance, and significant lifestyle changes. I live with diagnosed cognitive impairment. It is stable, managed, and part of my daily landscape.

I never began that dialogue. Until now.

Why now?

Turning sixty is a surprisingly effective motivator — particularly when accompanied by a widening waistline. As someone who has been small most of my life, finding myself preoccupied with weight and body shape comes with a measure of discomfort and, admittedly, some shame.

I am not alone. Research suggests that concerns about body image do not fade with age. Surveys show that more than half of women in their sixties report that weight or body shape negatively affects their lives — and many think about it daily. In studies of women ages 60–70, the majority report some level of body dissatisfaction.

Knowing that I am not alone, however, has not been enough to get me moving.

What finally shifted for me was this: I have spent years reading about cognitive impairment, vascular disease, and brain health. I know that regular movement improves blood flow. I know it is associated with better memory and thinking skills. I know it is one of the few interventions repeatedly linked to lower dementia risk.

Public health guidance consistently points to exercise as protective. Even modest daily movement has been associated with slower cognitive decline. Structured lifestyle programs combining exercise, diet, and mental engagement have shown measurable improvements in cognitive testing among adults in their sixties and seventies.

Exercise is not framed merely as symptom management. In Parkinson’s disease, neurologists are studying whether sustained, structured exercise may slow progression itself. If movement can influence the course of neurological disease, then surely it deserves more seriousness in my own life.

And yet, knowing all of this has not made me move.

If exercise is medicine for the brain, perhaps I need to treat it like research.

I was so convinced that I needed structure that I even attempted to enroll in clinical trials. If I could become a participant in someone else’s study, surely I would comply. But qualifying for a study is not as simple as enthusiasm. Being “at risk” was not enough.

So instead, I am beginning a modest experiment of my own.

Here is my research question:
Can an almost sixty-year-old woman with cognitive impairment improve her brain health through exercise — and, incidentally, fit back into her preferred skirt size?

The existing literature suggests she can and should.

Over the coming months, I will train — not for aesthetics alone, but for cognition. I will track a few simple markers. I will walk, lift, and observe.

This is not a clinical trial. No one is funding it. No one is monitoring compliance. There are no MRI scans scheduled.

But there will be walking. There will be strength training. There will be observation.
And perhaps, if the research is right, there will be improved blood flow — to the brain, and possibly to the waistline.

In the coming weeks, I will outline the structure of this experiment and share what I am measuring, how I am training, and what changes — if any — begin to emerge.

Thank you, City of St. Peterburg for the photo of North Straub Park — one of my favorite places to walk.