How do you cope with the nastiness?

I did say that she might want to sort out the kitchen. And it did need a good clean. I'll put everything back where it was when she goes. I thought mum would like someone looking after her!

Orchard

The carer doesn't sound very sympathetic. Why would you rearrange someone's cupboards? Especially a vulnerable persons?

So glad I found this thread. My mother (87) has been out of hospital for a month; to make life easier for her and me (I live 50 miles away), I have paid for a live in carer. Mum now insists she will manage on her own. The poor carer committed the terrible sin of rearranging the kitchen cupboards. I dread going to see her, she just complains all the time, and I know she won't manage on her own.
She shouted at me this week because I had moved something. I have a horrible feeling it might be the start of dementia.

It's horrid. It really is.
I've been coping by stepping back
I only go 2-3 times a week to mums now not everyday
I don't phone unless she texts/phones me
We had a big argument a few weeks ago and she's unhappy that I told her a few home truths
Her health is deteriorating but she is in total denial about it
She is going to Ireland for 2 days to see her sister who has had a stroke on 24th so that'll be a break for me!
I wish I had answers 😔
I just koko I suppose

This is an old thread, I know, but it's been so helpful to read. My mother is very angry with the world and dumps all that anger on me. Commiserations to everyone in the same boat.

rizle that's certainly good for thought, thankyou

SoConfused my mother is the same too, I'll be telling her something important, l
About an illness or exam results etc and she doesn't listen, she just is waiting to interject with something random

I use Mumsnet for gossip and fun usually but the comments on here have been so helpful. I'm assuming my mum has dementia when in fact it (the personality change) may just be natural ageing, I'm not sure which is worse to be honest. I won't even know what the memory consultant says as she won't let me go with her as she says I'm wishing dementia on her!

It is hard but it's also easy not to realise how much our bodies deteriorate as we age - not just the outside but inside as well. So, for example, our nervous system just does not connect the way it used to and this must be the same with our thinking, behavioural and perhaps even belief systems too. Often older people are completely unaware of this degeneration.

I think the answer is not so much to challenge behaviour [this is seen as dangerous in dementia patients] but to accept the way our relatives are today and to accept that this is just another [albeit difficult and sad] stage of life the same as the way that toddlers and babies behave is a different stage of life.

This is painful as difficult elderly relatives are not where we would want them to be but maybe they are not where they want to be either and that's probably painful too.

Gosh, this thread has resonated. Placemarking to participate later

My DM has gradually fallen out with all but one of her friends due to her nastiness. She however doesn't acknowledge that she could have been at fault, and constantly talks about her silly her friends are that they no longer want anything to do with her (some of them have been friends for 60 years). The one friend she does have also has dementia, and also had a recent stroke. I can't believe how she tolerates my mum's rudeness towards her, and I can only think that her own dementia means that she doesn't necessarily always understand it.

My DM is absolutely vile to me at the moment. She's always been pretty hard on me but she's on a different level now. She has a lot on her plate and isn't coping well with it but it's very difficult dealing with the constant criticism and histrionics.

Yeah it sometimes is something unrelated with my Mum which I find infuriating but isn't always the case. Sometimes she'll hear half the story (3 or 4 words..) assume that's the full story and go off on her own rant about that. Whilst I'm left trying to tell her that she's wrong and then I get the shitty attitude for telling her she's got it wrong, no matter how nicely I word it! Filthy look, "bloody cheek" rolls eyes. Doesn't sound like hard work to someone who's never been through it, but imagine EVERY. SINGLE. SENTENCE. you EVER say to your Mum, being interrupted & misinterpreted....? Being unable to tell her anything - at all. I've resorted to writing her emails. Problem is, if it's not pictures of her granddaughter or a funny jokey email then she's not interested and doesn't usually read them :(
OP, I feel your pain xx

My dad has Huntington's disease, and he can be an absolute beast - incredibly spiteful, critical, and hurtful. He always had a rather nasty streak, but the dementia aspect of the disease has exacerbated it.

I know he can't help it, but it's very hard to separate 'ill dad' from 'well dad', who could also be horrid.

SoConfused, my dad interrupts and talks over people too, often about something completely unrelated to what you're trying to tell him. He also has a tendency to fib/confabulate.

Everyone on here has my sympathies

My Mum is 73 and I'm at my wits end with her... Over past few years she has become very difficult. Despite the fact she's very intelligent and on the ball, she's just become very critical in some things that is not her business, totally uninterested in things she should be, but most of all - the bloody interrupting! She's actually got to the point where it's every single sentence I say. So I now if I have anything important to tell her, I have to plan my sentence carefully!! To make sure I get the important parts of it into the first half of the sentence before she butts in. Doesn't help that it's one of my biggest pet hates!! Anyone else's elderly parent/relative do this?

I work with the elderly and I see a lot of it. Sometimes it's the beginnings of dementia, but I also see a lot of people putting up with downright rudeness and deliberately selfish behaviour from the elderly that they wouldn't tolerate for a minute from a friend or a sibling or a child or a customer. It may break the habit of a lifetime but call them out on it - 'no need to be so nasty' or even 'did you mean to be so rude?'. Being old doesn't give you the right to be unpleasant.

they were buy........they were BUSY

One of the things that can happen to people as they age is that infirmity shrinks their horizons - things that would once have washed by them because they were buy loom large in their lives and their minds.

I must be so hard for you. I think the only way is to be jokily up front with him. "Gosh you are an old grump today!"

I understand. My dad lives over 100 miles away in a remote place and I haven't lived with or near him for 40 years or seen him that often as he has always been difficult. And now I suddenly have sole responsibility for him. I feel like having an enormous toddler tantrum. IT'S NOT FAIR!

It is really, really hard. My mum went through a stage of being really nasty, but as her dementia progressed it got better (though never back to her real self, and it may be that as she lost communication we just don't hear it as much).
Dad has very early dementia, lots of health problems, and cares for mum (with a team). He is incredibly touchy, downright nasty about people, and if things aren't as he thinks they should be, gets himself very worked up. I get accusing phonecalls for a) not being at home b) not having told him I'll be away (even for a day) c) accusing me or DH of not liking him. I don't provide daily care as I live 80 miles away and haven't lived with or near them for 26 years, so going back to have to account for my movements is a bit of a drag!

I cope by just ignoring the bad behaviour. I can't change it, he's lashing out in frustration and hurt and nothing will make a difference. Its bloody hard, it really is.

My DF has been like this for a while and I found it very upsetting. The lack of interest in me and my life I actually find harder than the nastiness. I do so much for him. I have sacrificed a lot. I also have a job, studies, children and my own life but he never asks about it and shows no enthusiasm or engagement in my news.

Although he still doesn't have a diagnosis it's really clear he has dementia (probably frontal temporal lobe) and I found that reading about the symptoms and other people's experiences helped me. I try to think of myself as a nurse or carer and him as a patient. It's not easy but gives me the detachment I need to cope.

It's hard, and very wearing. My DM has become really selfish and is only interested in herself, and wanting to talk about what she wants to talk about etc. I have to force myself to spend time with her.

My experience is that my Dad, who has frontal lobe dementia, blames me for losing his license - and tells me in detail about it and how he hates me and will never trust me again. It's hard - people say that this isn't "my real Dad" but if it walks like a duck etc....

He's so hurtful. I try to say 'yeah whatever' because I would never have gotten away with that as a teenager! Childish but true. I often have to walk away as otherwise I'd be just as bad as him...

And of course, come here and vent and share, so we can all compare what we're on the receiving end of. Sending an unmumsnetty hug.

I get a lot of this. I tend to see my mother as a wounded animal flailing out at any- and every-one when she feels under threat. This week has been bad as her normal carer is away, and though the replacement is lovely, my mother is struggling to cope with a change in routine and has been pretty beastly.

A short course of anti-depressants a year ago worked wonders for her. She came off them quite quickly but they seemed to reset her mood, and it has been much better. Or maybe I have got used to it, and better able to avoid triggers.