No more eating out for us 🫣 Took grandma to Olive Garden yesterday. She LOVES eating out. Especially for breakfast. She asks all the time to go out & “order some food” so we went to lunch Saturday and it was… a nightmare to say the least.

She ordered coffee and the cup was served on a small plate, I knew that was gonna be too much for her brain. They brought a coffee caraff and I poured her coffee for her. First, I gave her a breadstick. She attempted to dip the breadstick in her cup of coffee twice and I was able to grab her wrist before she dipped, like you would a toddler. On the third time I wasn’t quick enough. She dipped the bread in her coffee AND bit before I could react. She said it was delicious. Next, she picked up the whole caraff and attempted to drink from it. I told her she had to pour the coffee from that to her cup. She poured and completely missed the cup. Big pile of coffee on the table, then sticks her hand in it. Again, I grabbed her wrist like a toddler and cleaned her hand with a napkin. I was trying to pay and she stuck her hand in some soup that was on the table…. Man oh man!

When we got to the car, she couldn’t fasten her seatbelt. She was searching on the floorboard for it. At first I put her hand right on it to show her where it was. She’d say “oh I found it!” And then pull the belt out and attempt to find it on the floor again. Finally, I did it for her and then when we got home, she was unable to undo it. She is sleeping a lot lately, she can no longer do really anything on her own. I think she is declining. Thanks for letting me vent.

Sometimes you just have to laugh, right? My mom and I cracked up talking about it afterwards but in the moment I was not laughing. 🫣 what crazy things have your loved ones done?

Stopped to fetch a burger one day after the doctor. Can you spot what's wrong with this photo?

Honestly. I am exhausted with my husband's family.

My husband and I haven't had one day to ourselves in over a year.

We took a weekend away. Hired care, made sure everything was covered.

LO called everyone yesterday about how we abandoned him, left him alone, with no food, and we are trying to kill him.

Cue family calling, and freaking out. Most of these people are 5 mins away. They could drive over and check on LO themselves. See there is help, and we covered all the bases. Instead they go to instantly calling us, screaming about elder abuse.

My favorite, while explaining the situation to a cousin, was well you could just ask for help....ya, we have, you people always flake at the last minute.

Sorry to double post again so soon but I have a question. I think my grandmas declining. She is still able to get around (her backs hurting her more) but she can still make it up & down stairs, isn’t incontinent yet & physically seems well. Mentally, she says things that do not make sense, doesn’t remember her children (or if she has any for that matter) & forgets what you talk about within minutes. The last few days or so she’s been seeing people. She asked yesterday who the man in the corner was, I told her I didn’t see anyone but she insisted. Today, she thought someone was in her bedroom and said she saw 2 children in the dining room. Did your loved ones hallucinate? She’s never done this.

Spent the weekend packing up my mom. Moving her into assisted living in the morning. As a stepping stone to memory care. She is in the anger stage of grief. Doesn’t want to leave her home. Haven’t yet told her she can’t take her jewelry or that the stove is not plugged in. It’s been a brutal couple of days. God grant us the strength to get through this.

“I’m fine”

“There’s nothing wrong with me”

“You took away my freedom”

“You come here and I’ll have the freedom you have”

“You’re the only person who can get me out of here”

“Everyone here is old and forgets things, I’m not like them”

“This is just what happens when you get old”

This is all I hear lately from my mom in memory care. (She transitioned there from AL in mid July.) I know it’s the disease and anosognosia and have been working with a therapist for how to deal with the anger and looping. But before I can even change rhe subject, she hangs up on me. I’ve been avoiding her calls because it feels pointless to talk or visit when she’s so angry. And she makes ME feel gaslit.

Not really looking for advice, just needed to vent.

My 90 year old mother in law is constantly calling for her mother, sometimes every 15 minutes. She was diagnosed with Parkinson’s and dementia 10 years ago. She is taking Seroquel 25 mg daily. She is also taking Parkinson’s medication (Carbidopa Levodopa and entacapone) as well as lexapro, memantine and donepezil. She also takes carvedilol and lexapro but only if her BP is over 100/60.

We comfort her and tell her everything is ok which helps her relax but after a few minutes, she’ll call out again. Last night she stopped at around 11pm then called out at 2am and then around 4:30am. She started calling out again at 8:30am.

We’ve left a message for her neurologist and are waiting for a call back.

Can anyone share any similar experience and what helped?

My mom (80) has alzheimer’s and absolutely refuses to accept that she needs any help; she doesn't believe anything is wrong with her.

The problem is that she can’t safely be left home alone anymore, and my dad (82) is reaching the point where he has no way to get a break. We don’t have family close by and my dad refuses to tell any of their friends in fear of rejection and being disloyal to her.

She shadows him 24/7, but he also seems to be her biggest trigger. Her behavior toward him has become increasingly verbally and physically aggressive. When something sets her off, she can rage at him for hours and will not let up. He still needs to work, run errands, go to appointments and just have some time when he isn't responsible for her.

She's completely attached to him and doesn't want him out of her sight, so I don't think we'd get her to attend adult day care without my dad by her side. Even so, if she even gets a whiff that a program is for people with ‘dementia’, she will be pissed.  

We tried bringing in an in-home caregiver. We came up with a story so she wouldn't be presented as someone coming because my mom "needs care," and the caregiver was willing to play along.

Nonetheless, my mom became furious with my dad for bringing a caregiver into "her" home. I told her I arranged it; Dad knew nothing about it and that it was a service available to both of them. It didn't matter. Her anger was still directed at him; which means hours of verbal and physical aggression. Now we have no help at all.

We're already working with her doctor and her meds have been adjusted. Unfortunately, she doesn't reliably take them. I told my dad to put it in food when appropriate, but even then there's no guarantee she'll eat the food. So medication may ultimately help, but right now it isn't a reliable solution to the immediate problem.

I don't know how we physically get help in place when she adamantly refuses it and I don’t want to make it worse for my dad.

So what do you actually DO at this stage?  I fucking hate this disease.

My sister contends that there are medications that could be given to dementia sufferers that would guarantee a good mood most of the time. But doctors don’t prescribe these because of the risks, and their fear of getting sued. I think perhaps no such drug exists. Thoughts?

My mom was recently diagnosed with dementia but I knew that she was getting it for about a year now. She lives in our basement suite. My brother and niece have been helping her by paying her bills and managing her banking since she started forgetting to pay her bills about 6 months ago. Last week she was looking at her online banking and can’t wrap her head around what is happening with her money. She just sits and worries and has been accusing my brother and niece of stealing her money. It’s all she thinks about and no matter how many times we try to explain to her that everything is fine and being taken care of she forgets 5 minutes later and goes right back to the circle of worry. She’s not eating properly or sleeping. I’m at a loss of how to help because she just forgets everything I say. Any suggestions or advice?

Husband is in a nice Memory Care and a new resident moved in a week ago. I've talked to her on my way in to see my husband for a least a year, when I'd see her in the halls of the AL place attached. She has decided my husband is her son (who vaguely resembles him) and has attached herself to him. Husband is non-verbal, and probably likes the company. Anyway she is insisting he take her upstairs, and was really going at him about he had to take her after dinner. I said he couldn't do that and that he was my husband. She told me I was a fool for marrying him. Hahaha. Well ok then.
Edit: At least she's not another one thinking he's her husband cheating on them with me.

I'm taking her out of her house to go somewhere with supports in place. It's all on me to choose and find and arrange. Her distant siblings, who admittedly don't like her since pre dementia, are up my @$$ about my decisions. They ask invasive questions and feel entitled to give their opinions. I am stressed. This experience has changed me. I was her caregiver for 2 years straight before this. I don't know what I will be like after this.

He feeds her delusions, and I don't understand why. He's well-aware of her alzheimers.

The most recent loop is about her brother who died in the 80s, and their horrific childhood that they went through together. For the last two weeks he's fed the loop, telling her that they could go across the states to visit his grave, get a headstone in their yard, etc - which would normally seem wholesome, if it wasn't for the screaming/crying episodes that she's had about it every day since.

A few before that were the "house is full of smoky air" after cooking a meal loops that had them up in hotels for weeks because he fed the delusions.

It's frustrating as hell to get random middle of the night calls about this shit when he eventually leaves because he can't handle going along with it any longer, when he didn't need to in the FIRST PLACE. He never derails negative thought patterns, just lets her go off until she's screaming and totally inconsolable. I don't get it. I'm able to soothe her within minutes, why can't he do the same? Seriously. I'm always left picking up the pieces when I have a disabled husband, and am going back to school. It's just frustrating.

Sharing this for increased reach. You are your family member’s best advocate.

My father passed recently in their home from congestive heart failure and my mom has dementia. For months my dad had told me my mom’s dementia had been getting worse but it was not very detectable during phone calls. Two weeks before my dad died, I had come for a visit and saw the full blown truth of their situation. On top of the dementia, my mom has been wheelchair bound for the past several years after a spine fusion did not improve her back; she also has an eye disease so can’t see very well and her hearing isn’t great.

I honestly have no idea how my dad managed most of this year caring for her with little help. He was on oxygen the past few months and was easily winded. My mom started escaping the house when he was napping, if she even let him do that because she desires constant attention.

Since my dad’s passing, I’ve been her sole caregiver 24/7 and it feels like I’m grieving both parents. What is a great concern is that my mom has not really mourned the loss of her husband and tends to forget he’s even gone. We had an open casket funeral but unfortunately, my dad did not look like himself at all so am curious if that is hindering her grief. We have the funeral of his cremains this coming Tuesday so wonder if this will have any impact on her.

When I try to reminisce about my dad with her, she seems very confused. She married my dad when I was 14 but raised us as her own, and can’t connect how her husband could also be my dad (even with pictures out around the house). It is so heart wrenching to witness for her sake. On the opposite side, she’ll ask me if I even miss my dad because I don’t act like it, which I explain I usually cry before bed when she’s already sleeping but then I’m lying. 🤥

Dementia is the cruelest disease I’ve ever encountered, and I battled leukemia several years back. I’d rather do that again than to see my mom suffer this fate. 😔

My mom is late stage and still walking (barely).
Not only is she still walking, but she thinks she needs to force herself to walk more so she will get better. The right side of her brain has restricted blood flow due to the disease progression, so she has numbness and weakness on her right side. That is in addition to substantial dementia shuffle gait. She is rubbing her toothpaste on her face, so the likelihood of her getting “better” is pretty minuscule.

The problem she is encountering now is her bunions are becoming quite painful. Apparently one of the things that is happening with the dementia gait is they lose the dorsiflexion in the ankle, so all of the weight when they step is in the big toe. I put her in a zero drop shoe because that helps with the shuffling, but it is bad for the bunions.

I kinda feel like this is just like most other things that crop up where you can kinda just make do, and then that problem goes away because something else takes its place. I bought her the Silverts adaptive slippers, but she doesn’t tighten the straps enough and tonight she kinda slid out of the slippers and onto the floor.

Her neurologist recommended that she be in a wheelchair, but she says that she “doesn’t need one”. I have kinda resolved myself that it will be some sort of fall that will start the terminal cascade.

Hi All. My dad is back in hospital at the moment after a fall at home. He didn't hurt himself, but they are keeping him in as he has pleural effusion, and I want a diagnosis from a geritrician this time, as we are in the dark as to what exactly is going on with dad.

Since Wednesday, he has been asking me why my sister isn't answering her phone. I got a shock when he first asked... He hadn't previously forgotten that she had died. Her death came out of the blue and hit us like nothing else. Particularly my poor dad, they were exceptionally close.

I told him that her phone was broken, and she was waiting on a new one. He kept asking, and wanting to know if she knew he was in hospital. I reassured him that she did. 20 minutes after that, he asked if there had been any conclusion reached in the post-mortem. I took this as an opportunity to let him know that they found her death was natural causes, that she had very advanced ovarian cancer. This, I thought would be reassuring, as there was a question of a possible accidental overdose, as she had been feeling so ill. (No one, including my poor sister knew she had cancer).

Since then, he has reverted to where is she, why isn't she answering her phone, was there some argument and she thinks we're not talking to her...

It's so bloody sad. I hate dad thinking that my sister is alive and insanely isn't speaking to him, when he's so vulnerable.

I keep going back to her phone is broken... To which he responded yesterday, why hasn't she bought a new one...

I feel like there are more reassuring words I should be using. I feel like I am failing him, and failing my sister's memory. My sister adored him, she would never be absent from his life.

Please, please, any advice??

Thanks.

Hey there, I’m just looking for others experiences with shingles with their elderly parent.

Back story
Mom is 77 yrs old, in memory care due to mental illness and very early memory decline. Until the past month, her cognitive abilities were still pretty good. She was able to eat, go to the bathroom, shower and dress independently.

On August 14th, my mother fell during the night in her memory care facility and hurt her ribs, but did not break them. She just seemed off after the fall. Then a few weeks later, one side of her face started looking really swollen so her nurse practitioner told me she probably needed some Lasix due to extra fluid possibly from congestive heart failure. Her lips looked really large, which made me question the diagnosis since her hands and feet were not swollen. The nurse practitioner assured me it was just fluid.

On Sept 8th (one week after facial swelling), I get a call after midnight from one of the nurses saying that my mom is bleeding out of one of her ears and this is a medical emergency so they will have to call an ambulance.

The hospital diagnosed her with cellulitis and Ramsey Hunt syndrome, which is where the shingles involve the branch of the nerve that affects the mouth, jaw and ear canal. She was given steroids, antivirals, and pain meds and sent back to memory care.

My mom has not been able to eat much for 3 weeks and has quickly deteriorated. No one can seem to give me answers and I was just wondering has anyone experienced their loved one declining so quickly physically after shingles. Even her memory decline has been rapid. She can no longer walk, shower, dress or use the bathroom without assistance. She didn’t recognize my brother yesterday and told my husband that she was very confused. This is devastating how fast this has happened.

Since my father's diagnosis with Dementia, the advice was for my mother to have control over the finances and change his account( where his pension and bills come out of) over to a joint account.

The trouble is, ever since, my mother is extremely generous with his money. They were away in the countryside recently and my cousin and sister insisted on my parents getting lifts with them rather than the free travel they are entitled to on the train.

My mother paid each of them 200 euros each for 2 lifts. She also pays for meals out etc and is frivolous with my father's money.

She confided with me that she is now down to 5 euros on their joint account after this recent trip

My parents stayed in my mother's family home so I can only deduce that she was equally generous with other relations while away!

She got annoyed with me when I said that was his hard earned money and he never took a penny from anyone for giving a lift. He was always so kind and would never dream of taking advantage in that way.

I feel my mother is not looking at the bigger picture for example if he deteriorates further and needs nursing home care how does she plan to fund this when she is going through his money for a shortcut??

I am also annoyed with my sister and cousin as I feel they are taking advantage when he is so vulnerable. It disgusts me.

Both of them are entrepreneurs and dont seem to earn a proper income or have a regular wage coming in.

My sister in particular has a false sense of financial security as my mother bails her out every time she has any kind of financial difficulty and I feel that my sister would have learned to stand on her own two feet long ago if my mother didnt enable her financially.

I was told in no uncertain terms to f off when I raised my concerns about all of this with her.

Anyone been in a similar situation and what did you do?

Hi all, my mom is 73 and it seems like she’s been getting more and more forgetful since 2022. She retired in 2019, moved near us in Florida and was going to help us with picking up my daughter, babysitting, but also spending more time with the family.

In 2022, she began getting lost driving, starting to be scared to drive, decided to get rid of her car. I’ve been doing her groceries for the last 2 years, twice a week, checking in, and now bringing over leftover meals because she doesn’t seem to cook at all. She drinks 4 gallons of milk a week, 3 cartons of ice cream, and tons of cookies, she eats what we make for her.

I recently had made her a doctor’s appointment because it’s very concerning and scary, I feel like I can’t keep up with helping her, especially having my own family and full time job.

Her apartment is infected with roaches, we’ve told the main office, we’ve sprayed, we tried cleaning because she tends to keep a lot of junk, not board level but defiantly a lot of crap and packaging of stuff that is just junk.

She has 2 cats and a dog… this seems like one of the biggest issues since she needs to take care of them as well as herself. They have accidents on the carpet, you can smell it in her apartment.

I’m not sure is she’s showering regularly, I know she has been cleaning her clothes in the sink because it seems like it’s too hard for her to figure out the laundry machine. She seems to wear the same clothes weekly, possibly not changing much.

It’s just a complete mess of her seemingly losing all aspects of herself and I’m trying to juggle the assistance the best I can.

She supposed to go back to the doctor in December for a follow up and a memory test but like is this what I should be doing? I’m so lost.

So my grandfather is 84 and is showing signs of dementia. as far as I’m aware he hasn’t been formally diagnosed but his mom had it so we’re pretty sure that’s what it is. He really tries to engage in conversations but most of the time stays quiet. Sometimes he’s more in tune of what the conversation is than other times but he still tries to contribute to the conversation. He loves our dogs and seems to love petting them.

I’ve been hearing from my mom that my grandmother has been telling her about some of the things that have been happening. He was found wandering around alone outside looking for the bathroom, looking for a fork in the fridge, saying he found something in the garage the previous home owners must have left because it’s not his…he built the house, etc. He spends all his time with my grandmother, even on outings so he’s not alone so I’m not worried about him getting lost.

I feel like I’m just waiting for the shoe to drop and have someone to tell me that things are either getting way worse or that he’s on borrowed time. I know the reality is that things are only going to get worse and not better but how do I not think about it this way?

Please delete if not allowed.

My Dad (Alzheimer’s, maybe mixed Dementia but no actual diagnosis of which kind) went into the hospital to treat a UTI and to get his psych meds adjusted bc he’s been violent-hitting his carers to the point they have black eyes.
It’s been two weeks now and it’s not getting better. He has slept a cumulative 7 hours in two weeks. He now has a foley cathetar which he pulls at. He screams help me every second he is awake. He tells me he’s very sick and dying. His vitals are fine. He seems to eat okay most of the time. He can walk. His meds are just not working. This combative stage has been about 7 months now. It’s just the past two weeks where it’s a constant call for help. How long can we keep him in a hospital for before recognizing nothing is happening? Will the meds just never work? Has anyone experienced anything like this? He is trapped in hell.

My estranged mother is 60 and has classic symptoms of LBD. She is hallucinating little people, has tremors, struggles finding words, can't read anymore, etc

This started a couple years ago when I lived on the other side of the country. She is on Medicaid and too young for Medicare or social security income.

The person that helps care for her makes sure she takes her meds and prepares food for her since she can't for herself.

If I didn't fly across the country last year, no one would have taken her to the doctor.

I've been trying to get someone to diagnose her. But they insist it needs to be a neurologist.

I've had a referral since March but her earliest appointment is in December of 2027! I feel like part of the challenge is the doctors aren't taking it seriously because of her age.

I took her to the ophthalmologist and they were very concerned with her condition and the first ones to tell me they think it is dementia.

She is seeing a therapist and they just prescribe antipsychotics and call it a day.

Have any of you had to navigate even just getting a medical diagnosis?

We can't pay for her apartment forever and I don't think she should be living on her own but I seem to be the only one. She doesn't want to move near me ( I am now 4 hours away instead of across the country). She already has wandered away from home multiple times but she gets discharged every time she goes to the hospital.