MIL with Dementia visiting

[Glenthebattleostrich]

Sorry I just need to offload so I can keep the smile in place. So before anyone says I'm a bitch or whatever I'm venting here so I can stay lovely to her.

MIL has dementia. We are waiting for a reassement as she has gotten significantly worse. I'm talking not recogising her granddaughter, asking how I know her son, telling me she used to have a son called xxx but she doesn't know what happened to him worse.

We have her to stay this weekend as her daughter who does most care (lives over the street from her) needed a weekend off and I had stuff already in the diary so we brought her here. I also want my DH to see just how bad she is.

Yesterday she arrives and doesn't recognize me or DD. Had a very pleasant chat about people I may know. I went to my work night out and she pulled down a curtain pole (DH was with her). I got home to find her in her underwear and coat telling us she was off for the bus home. Managed to get her to bed and she was up several times in the night.

Today she has shouted and sworn, accused me of stealing her pen (which she lost years ago), stolen 2 inhalers of mine and generally been Fucking unbearable. DD is hiding in her bedroom, DH is still trying to be in denial and I'm halfway down a bottle of wine before I scream.

I understand it is her condition and not her fault. I'm actually angry that the NHS refuse to see her for 6 months and social services refuse to do an assessment. I'm furious that her children won't go private to get the care she needs (it would be tight but we could do it). Mostly I'm Fucking angry that no one will accept that she needs help and extra care. I'm pissed off that I'm being forced to be the bad guy forcing the issue by refusing to have her to stay again because of the impact on my daughter.

I Fucking hate Dementia.

All sympathy OP

We had a relative with dementia living with us when I was a kid - it had a really detrimental impact on our childhoods and was the straw that broke my family's back,

It sounds like you are getting to a solution, so just keep chipping firmly away at it by supporting your DH. Your SIL has probably lost the plot under the strain, both she and your MIL will be far better off with your MIL in a home with 24 hour care. Anyone who says otherwise hasn't a clue.

All my sympathy to you and your SIL (been there)

Hopefully this is the trigger for getting the right kind of help and care for your MIL.

In the meantime, in my experience, patients with dementia do MUCH better when kept to their own routine and in a familiar environment. Even if she has been a frequent visitor to your home in the past, she won't have remembered and this triggers lots of odd behaviour (says the woman woken by her own mother entering her bedroom at 4am with a torch shining in our eyes!)

@Defiantlynot41 , ditto to all that about routine.

For FiL’s first Christmas after moving to his care home, we thought it’d be nice to bring him here for a couple of nights - he’d always enjoyed Christmas with us before, hadn’t he?

Despite the care home staff telling us it wouldn’t be a good idea, we thought we knew best and went ahead.
Having lived with us before he had been very familiar with our house, but it was a bad mistake. He was disoriented, often agitated and fretful - he thought it was his own house and that there were various jobs he ought to be doing. And for the first time, he started asking where MiL (dead some 10 years) was.

Initially we made the next mistake of explaining - very gently - that she’d died, but he was terribly upset and cried - only to forget and ask again half an hour later. So we started saying she’d just gone to the shops, or to visit Auntie So-and-So - and he’d be quite happy.

When it came to my DM, some years later, we didn’t make that Christmas mistake again - would visit her on the day, or just before - the CH was luckily close by - but TBH by then, despite lovely decorations in the care home, she was never aware that it was Christmas and (unlike in pre dementia years) wasn’t at all interested in presents - unless they were chocolates!

We learned such a lot only by experience - this was well before a lot of info being available online.

Just wanted to thank everyone for their support and advice and update on my actions taken.

It's been a busy week. MIL has had a terrible week at home, she is refusing to shower, her sleep patterns are worse than ever, she is incontinent (SIL trying to get her to the docs to check for a urine infection but MIL is refusing to go), being aggressive and hallucinating more.

The positive is that the whole family are actually talking now and SIL and DH have agreed that I can take over the admin involved with MILs care as SIL isn't coping. So I gave chased up the social services referral, they are going to do an assessment alongside one with the Memory Clinic. I have chased the memory clinic too, they told me there was a 12 week wait and tried to fob me off until I pointed out it's been 14 weeks since she was referred! The admiral nurses are visiting next week and we are having a phone meeting with age UK lady to discuss housing options and care packages we can expect. We are also filing in the forms to to become personal welfare deputies as we don't have health power of attorney, only financial.

I have also booked a night away for SIL and her partner as a Christmas gift and we will be going up to stay with MIL (me in a hotel, DH with her) and have arranged for a friend to go up with me in February to assess the house and getting it cleared (she does this for a living).

SIL knows she can call and message me at any time for support and is finally being honest about everything. She feels like a weight has been lifted because I'm doing the admin bits. We have never been close, always got on fine but very different types of people. She is quite passive and doesn't like to make a fuss, I can be what is politely called forceful if and when I need to be!!! I am taking the family diary up next visit and we are putting in dates we will be going to provide respite.

DH is looking at finances and researching care providers, cleaners, estate agents etc - the practical stuff. He is also looking at taking a Friday per month off to be able to visit and help with appointments.

So we are moving forward and hopefully have the appointments sorted by the end of the year and we can start the new year moving towards MIL being secure and comfortable.