AIBU to wonder how you first notice if a person has Alzheimer?

[Eagly456]

I am just wondering, have a relative (86 years old) who tells me the same thing over and over again.
Often little things from her youth/childhood like “when I was a child my mother used to bake cherry cakes as soon as the cherries were ripe“. I mean I don’t mind. I just wonder if it is a bad sign.

Personality changes were the first thing we noticed with my relative. Normally a very gentle easy going cheerful sort, he became morose and snappy. My friends mum was the opposite, started whistling and singing around the house. This was before the noticeable forgetfulness and repetition.

With my Fil, the very first sign I noticed was when I went to visit and he’d completely forgotten that I was coming. Plus he was unshaven and wearing a dirty jumper - both unheard of before.

Though with hindsight, having no experience of it at the time, we should have realised some months before, when we were off to his youngest son’s wedding, and he asked just as we were leaving the house, ‘Where are we going again?’

With my mother, it was a sister who first noticed that on holiday she (an avid reader) was apparently starting the same book again from the beginning.
Having been through it all with FiL, I did my best to discount it - couldn’t face it again.

However the penny really did drop hard when she later phoned her bank about something - she’d always been very clued up about finances - and could not remember, literally the instant she’d put the phone down, what they’d said.
And not only that, but whereas she’d formerly have been very worried about such a thing, she’d forgotten the incident equally quickly.

All the best to anyone faced with this.

My Dad repeats things often, and to him it sounds as though he's telling the story for the first time so I always act as though it's the first time I've heard it. But he is in very poor health and his heart is in failure so I suspect it is vascular. He hasn't been diagnosed though. One of the stand out things for him is he'll say he fell asleep holding something and then the thing just disappeared, like a neck cushion he has. It was in a drawer but he swore blind he'd just had it on. And he thinks people have phoned him when they haven't. All these things are easily explained away by everyone except him.

My grandma started using words oddly. She kept using the word 'area' when it was like she was replacing all nouns relating to rooms/places - so "Have you seen the remote, it's in the - points at sofa area", "Richard's in the area - kitchen, he's in the kitchen". Then everything was "thingy". That was vascular dementia - not long after that she became very depressed, paranoid, and aggressive, and it was a horrible downhill, quickly-progressing slope over 3 years until she died.

My other grandma, who has Alzheimer's, tells stories repeatedly, often word for word exactly the same as she had earlier. She showed the first signs of it 10 years ago, was immediately put on medication, and it's only in the last 6 months that she's become really confused and withdrawn.

Different forms of these diseases present very differently, but repeating things is certainly something I saw with one of my grandmas.

My Mum became very disinhibited about sexual matters - previously she would never discus anything to do with sex at all. Then suddenly she started telling us quite "naughty" stories about her youth during the War. She'd suddenly start talking like that, no matter where she was or what was happening around her. That was the red flag for us , which made us head off to the doctor.

This. Out-of-character OTT touchiness or getting VERY easily offended, outbursts over nothing, or outlandish acccusations against family members (later proven to be unfounded).

Yes this with my mum. Total overrractions to minor situations. It’s only with hindsight that we realised though. She also forgot her debit card PIN number and denied she’d ever had one. She was diagnosed when she had a bout of acute depression which can mimic dementia, she was put on anti depressants which helped the depression but the memory loss etc remained.

My mum had vascular dementia and I can pinpoint the exact moment it struck me. I dropped in to see her without letting her know first and she was out. I sat in the car to wait for her to come home. I saw her coming up the street and her face was completely blank, she had a sort of “lights on but nobody at home” look.

There was no personality change at all but gradually she forgot words, started living in the past, repeating the same stories, hiding things - when I cleared the house after she died I found numerous envelopes containing £200 all over the place.

@Scarby9 I am not able to read a map. Never have been. I have to turn them upside down. BTW now that you mention it. DH had a head injury (and he has got ptsd + he was on medication when it happened). However after he hurt his head he has been to hospital and they said everything was alright with his head.

However his ability to read maps has worsened, on some days for example if he is tired he has to hold them upside down. Same with his ability to park a car. Both is not really important for his life and he doesn’t mind... but it’s odd.

My Nan made extra food for the people in photographs and started to tell us David Cameron had come to tea. It’s so sad, it got to the point where she though we had been stealing from her, she accused me of stealing her Tesco clubcard sounds so silly but she was adamant and it really upset everybody involved.

Another thing with my mum was that every time she made a cup of tea she would get another mug out of the cupboard, every time. She would use every mug in the house every day. And when making a sandwich, every time she needed a knife she would get another one out of the drawer. Like when buttering a slice of bread and needing to do the other she’d get another knife out instead of using the one she’d already used.

The first signs I noticed with my Dad was thinking they had a problem with insects which became quite paranoid. He also suddenly lost his sense of direction when driving which was highly unusual for him. His dementia was quite advanced in my opinion before he was diagnosed. Less than a year after diagnosis he is incontinent, very shaky and cannot walk, cannot remember who his family are.

Repeating stories is something that happens with old age so might not necessarily mean dementia.

Early signs for us (dad- eventually diagnosed with early onset Alzheimer’s): silly errors adding up numbers (and worked with numbers in his job),picking up items and wondering what they were such as a teaspoon and then laughing when we said it’s a teaspoon. Little bit vague on when he had been somewhere. Yes to the left/right/mapreading issues.

The first thing I noticed (in retrospect as at the time it seemed inconsequential) with my dad was when he didn't get a joke. He'd always get the joke but this time he took it at face value.

I had years of dementia hell with which to dissect and analyse when it started to happen

Telling you the same thing and asking the same question over and over again is a sign.

Also, another sign can be loss of language. So they just can't remember words. Especially in women. My Mum from really early on struggled to remember certain words.

It is so worth getting tested because I found with Dad that the tablets have helped.

My step-mum lost the ability to cook complicated meals like roasts or multi-dish Chinese/Indian food. It's only in hindsight that my dad realised this was a sign.

She also started repeating the same stories over and over again. Often the same one within half an hour. She now barely speaks, can hardly walk and spends her day looking at the TV. She really needs to go into a home now but my dad is finding it hard to let her go.

My MIL started with forgetfulness. Then she became verbally aggressive for about a year - DH says that when she stopped trying to pick a fight with him he felt there was something up. She had a fall and was hospitalised and this is where she was diagnosed - not Alzheimer's but Lewy Body Dementia which had previously been diagnosed as Parkinson's (similar disease progression). She slowly retreated into herself and ended up in a care home for the last 18 months of her life.

My Dad is 87 and since Mum died (just under 3 years ago now) his memory issues became much more apparent - often, the spouse is the one doing all the important remembering for the two of them.

He first presented with repetition - and because I'm the only one of the 3 of us (I have 2 brothers who live very near to Dad - I'm almost 2 hours away) who stays overnight, I picked up on the repeating of stories and comments much more quickly.

She also developed something the doctor referred to as "visual agnosia", which may have had something to do with it. Apparently, although you can see fine, your brain can't make sense of what you see. She used to ring me up to ask me the time, claiming the clock was broken and she couldn't find her watch. I got a new clock for the kitchen, and it became apparent that she couldn't tell the time any more.

This was the kind of thing that really alerted my brothers to Dad's obvious dementia - he began to forget how things worked and how to do basic 'operations' as well as not recognising things. For example, I was with him when he said "Where's the phone?" It was right next to him, where it always is.

It was my niece's 15th birthday on Monday and on Saturday I had to do a long chat with Dad about getting her a card, writing a cheque for her present (he can't do buying of presents). By the time I visited on Tuesday, he had absolutely no memory of any of it.

Typical signs are:

Word finding difficulties
Personality/mood changes
Sudden problems with things they had no issues with before - eg. banking online, driving, finding new places
Becoming forgetful- esp with short term memory
Becoming confused or easily frustrated with relatively simple things
Using the wrong objects for things, eg- using a knife as a pen
Seeing things and interpreting them oddly- eg. seeing a shadow and insisting it was a person
Becoming fixated on something and getting really agitated about it

Oh also forgot-
changes in personal hygiene, so, someone who always dressed smartly before wearing the same stained clothes for days on end etc

The first thing I noticed (in retrospect as at the time it seemed inconsequential) with my dad was when he didn't get a joke. He'd always get the joke but this time he took it at face value.

Just noticed this comment - this is very true for my Dad, who is a local legend for his sense of humour. He no longer makes the kind of quips he used to, doesn'get it when I do the banter with him that we've always done and has a very different personality now. It's very sad.

The thing is to ha ve her assessed, they ask a mix of questions and chat and there are signs in how things are connected. It can be a bit hit and miss asking about modern current affairs of someone with no tv for example but generally its how they pinpoint there are issues early. Try having conversations about modern issues and see what happens. I also found it was in the process of things so cooking a meal, no being able to cope with the organisation of it and eventually not able to make a cup of tea without intervention or even with intervention come to that right at the end. Mum could still fold washing and clothes towards the end. SO that was her job with the smaller items.

My Nan had a dog. A little Yorkshire Terrier she lived for. It had bows in it's hair, was groomed to perfection and went to the butchers every day for meat for its tea.
One of the neighbours called my Mum and asked if everything was ok as she'd seen Nan really shouting at the dog, something she'd never do. That was without doubt the first sign.

Next came walking to the shop at lunchtime, past the school kids at the local chippy and asking them for a chip. Amusing, and something Nan might have joked about with kids, but still unusual. Then she started to walk miles without telling us.

A horrid thing to say, but about six months in to this escalating behaviour she passed away in sleep, in her favourite armchair from a heart attack. I was devastated, but equally so relieved that she'd escaped it.

She also developed something the doctor referred to as "visual agnosia", which may have had something to do with it. Apparently, although you can see fine, your brain can't make sense of what you see. She used to ring me up to ask me the time, claiming the clock was broken and she couldn't find her watch. I got a new clock for the kitchen, and it became apparent that she couldn't tell the time any more.

Yes my mother would often ring me saying there was no food in the house even though I'd just done a shop for her and the fridge was full. Although she recognised people until the end she lost the ability to make sense of her surroundings.

These all started about 5 years before formal diagnosis but you could see she wasn't right

Major reminiscing about the past....
Some dementia sufferers lose their inhibitions which can lead to them being fairly rude - Mum used to say the honest truth about anyone she saw which could be quite embarrassing...
She also took against a childhood friend for absolutely no reason.
She became paranoid and obsessive about the most ridiculous things.
Fairly spectacular mood swings.
Her personal paperwork - usually so correct - went to pot. She could no longer do her tax return or understand a bank statement.

Oh and this pisses me off when people go on about their relative lying.
DEMENTIA SUFFERERS DO NOT LIE - THEY CONFABULATE!!!!
Dementia sufferers are unable to follow a conversation but they still want to talk to you. So they say the first thing that pops into their heads - they know that they want to talk but their brains are unable to produce a rational thought.
If they are convinced that something has happened then they think they are telling the truth which sounds like they are lying.
Mum has been talking for a long time about recently seeing relatives that died decades before. If I correct her on this, she gets very distressed/angry about it as she believes she is telling the truth.
Our 'conversations' now flow a lot better now I just take her lead. It does mean they are a bit surreal - like Alice going down the rabbit hole - but in her mind we're having a nice chat.
It does mean that I've actually not told her anything about my life for over 7 years as she just can't understand it but we still interact.
A friend is a consultant psychiatrist who specialises in geriatrics so he sees mostly dementia patients plus some patients that have had brain injuries such as strokes.
He sees families of patients that complain about the lies and is careful to explain that a dementia patient isn't lying, it's their damaged brain coming up with thoughts that they believe are true.
If only all geriatric psychiatrists were as clued up as him, it would stop a lot of distress from families & sufferers if it were explained properly.

This comes from the Alzheimer's Society & is very useful if you are wondering if the problems are old age or dementia:

OLD AGE V DEMENTIA

Jocasta2018 I think most people realise the lies are the illness talking and not the person.

Just because they don't know the technical term in plain English made up stories and accusations are lies.

Don't forget in the early stages these lies can cause trouble for other family members, like the husband being accused of hiding money, the 50yo son being accused of crazy parties in his mothers house.
Once people realise its nonsense then everyone is on the same side but until then it can be very difficult to deal with.