Early stages - accused of taking money

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my mum has been diagnosed with both vascular & alzheimers. I’m her nearest child, my sibling lives 5hrs away. She used to live 45 mins from me but we’ve moved her to an assisted living place 10 mins from me. I’m aware moving her wasn’t ideal however she had no support where she was, was struggling to cope in her house and we felt it was the best option. She’s said she has no regrets.

anyway, I’m really struggling, mainly with the changes in her, the aggressiveness towards me and the confusion. . It’s bloody hard as you all know.

A few days ago we were sorting through her handbag together. I found a stash of notes, she said she didn’t know she had them. We put them in 2 purses she carries round, all good. A couple of days later she messaged me asking for her money that I had taken., id taken nothing. We went back and forth in text with me asking if she’d looked in the purses, in her handbag, had she moved it somewhere else.
her replies were confused and went from the purses weren’t in her bag, the money wasn’t in the purses and I had taken it the other day.

I drive round but whilst I was on my way she text saying she’d found it in the purses that were in her bag and that she hadn’t looked in the bag before!
she accused me of taking her money and as far as I can make out hadn’t even looked.

Im aware this can be a thing with dementia however I’m really worried that if she starts this regularly then where is it going to end and do I need to protect myself or how do I protect myself?
I also have full POA so I have access to everything!

Say whatever you have to to pacify her.
There's not much else you can do, but try not to take it personally, hard though it is.
Just keep receipts and records up to date to keep yourself right.

Its grim. dM told me to buy a certain item from her for my birthday, which I did, using our joint cheque book. Three months later, she was going through the cheque stubs, and accused me of stealing from her by ‘using her cheque book’. 🤷🏻‍♀️ She had put me on the account because she ‘ didn’t want to be bothered with money anymore’.

You just have to shrug or go and shout at an inanimate object ( a tree in my garden knew a lot about my feelings). The only practical advice is a) try not to let her accumulate a lot of cash, as it can easily be lost or destroyed or given way b) let the warden know that she is making these accusations. They will have heard it all before, but they will be supportive.

It's hard but the PP is right, just try not to take it too personally. The brain sort of comes up with a story of how the money might be missing and as you're the nearest the story is that you've stolen it.

This happened with my gran too. My dad would give her a weekly amount of cash from her account for shopping etc. Before he had driven the ten minutes home she would be calling him accusing him of stealing from her. It's such a cruel disease. My dad is as honest as the day is long and those baseless accusations hurt.

This happened with my granny, my mother in law and now my mum. This week my mum was convinced that my daughter, who lives hundreds of miles away, had walked into her house and stolen “my small teddy bear”. Which is actually MY teddy bear who stays with me!
I think it maybe represents a feeling of loss of control and that everything is drifting away.
You do get used to it. You could maybe make notes in a diary when something like this happens. And try to reassure the person rather than arguing or defending yourself. Easier said than done I know!

Thanks all, I’m sorry you’ve all experienced the same.

DF has vascular dementia he has accused DM and also DB of stealing money. Neither have ever done anything like that, once was after he told DM to take 4k from some shares he sold for herself which she did. Then accused her of stealing money. DB has never had a penny and has been accused of stealing and of violence thats not happened either.

Strangely I've not been accused of anything.

Sadly it’s very common. Ditto hiding cash (and then forgetting!) in anything that could possibly serve as a ‘container - inside books, old shoes, cornflakes packets - it’s as well to check absolutely everything before binning.

A friend found £2k cash stashed in bits in between a big pile of newspapers and magazines after he died.

My mum advised my SIL of stealing her pearls. The same pearls that she had given to me.

If you think your sibling might believe her, keep an account book of everything you buy on her behalf, and note down every time you handle her cash for any reason.

My brother and I both have financial POA and access to mum's bank account. We trust each other implicitly, but we still tell each other when we spend anything for her, and occasionally ask each other to check through the account.

Very common and very upsetting. MIL used to go walkabout with money she found around the house (they'd got into the habit of drawing out substantial cash during Covid), then of course forgot where it was, and nobody had any idea whether she'd dropped it, hidden it, given it away, had it stolen by an outsider...but as far as she was concerned, it would have been 'taken' by whichever family member she saw first when it came to her mind. It would usually turn up somewhere hugely unlikely.
She kept this theme up even as a long-term hospital patient and nursing home resident, where of course she no longer had access to large amounts of cash, but remained nonetheless convinced it had been stolen from her. Along with everything else, poor woman. It's an awful disease.

Just a bit of solidarity as my mum has recently been diagnosed with Alzheimer's and is exactly the same. She checks her internet banking up to 10 times a day to make sure no one has stolen her money and has recently mislaid her purse somewhere in the house with £100 in it. The house has been turned upside down and there's no sign of it, so no idea what she's done with it, but now she's convinced someone has stolen it (even though no one has been in the house really).

It's really difficult isn't it. Does your mum need to have much cash on her? If not, maybe try and reduce it and pay for things online where possible and keep a record of how much is in accounts etc, withdrawals, deposits so it's all there written down for her to see when she gets anxious about it.

I set up a separate email address and email that address and my siblings whenever I need to take money out and I say what it was for so there is a record that can be cross referenced against the bank account.

Sadly very common
But that doesn’t help when the accusations of your loved one are aimed at you.

It’s very difficult to live through situations like this, we’re going through similar. We as a family try to keep conversations light hearted in an attempt to distract Mum to something more positive and humorous.
Try not to take things too personally, make notes/ or a diary of events and keep receipts for any purchases. It’s a cruel condition and can be a minefield to navigate. Don’t forget to take time for yourself whenever you can.

This was possibly the worst thing about my DM Alzheimer’s. It was always me, DH or DS who had stolen from her, despite the fact that we were constantly helping her. Other members of the family who had fucked off out of the picture were all “wonderful”. The amount of times I had to drop everything to race round to the house and find some misplaced suddenly incredibly important notebook, or glasses case, or post it with something written down by a “wonderful” (absent) family member. It escalated to her thinking we were going to break in and attack her, or that we had already broken in the previous night and “moved things around”. Medication (Respiridome) calmed her down. I felt so bloody isolated though and I’m ashamed to say it changed how I feel about her. I know it was the disease but it horrendous to go through.

By the way Op you absolutely did the best thing for her moving her to an assisted living place, it will give her independence for longer than if she stayed alone in a house.

This is the norm with my mum. She's yet to accuse me of stealing money yet, but currently she's accusing me of hiding the TV remote on her every day.

We found that quetiapine helped a bit with this - she was put on this after making more serious allegations against family members but it helped lessen the frequency of others.

All three of us siblings are aware of it now, as are neighbours and friends. Terrible thing to say but now when she says anything about someone else we just shake it off until we hear it elsewhere

My Dad sleeps with his purse under his pillow.

He lives with us so we can be sure he only takes a maximum of 200 at a time and that's when he's got things to pay out for, so he never has over 100. But he still keeps it close.

I've got a feeling he knows he's losing his memory and it's a protection thing so he has his money close by prepared.

This morning I woke to a voicemail from my mum. Called her up and was accused of stealing £2000 from her bank account. Apparantly I have been into her bank account and set up money to be sent to my account. I don't even have access to her account. It would be impossible for me to do. Im so upset. I just feel sick. Shes diagnosed with Mild Cognitive Impairment.

Sorry to hear that, @Infracat . It's terribly common. MIL never ever stopped being convinced people were stealing her money. The only person who ever secretly stashed it away was her. Before she went into hospital and then a home, she would hide large cash amounts and savings books in the weirdest places, or go walkabout with them, and of course forget what she'd done and put the blame on the first person she thought of, however unlikely the scenario.

Is there any way to work out if any money is actually missing?

Been there. Just say what you need to say to calm the situation. This may happen multiple times in a short space of time, just keep doing the same thing. And don’t take it personally - she’s not the person she was and won’t be again, but this might be a phase she moves on from as things progress. My mum went through a phase of hiding money in her house, forgetting where and accusing my nephews of stealing it (they were young boys at the time - it caused difficulties with my siblings, their parents). We gave her a purse with a few quid in it, and took over all her banking in the end. Its hard op, I sympathise.

Absolutely this. We found notes under the plastic insert of an empty box of biscuits. Every packet, box, book, magazine, envelope had to be pulled apart and shaken. Drawer linings. Behind drawers. Backs of cupboards.
Hand hold OP x

Ugh. Of all the million cruelties dementia inflicts on exhausted adult children and grandchildren, this is one of the most lasting wounds.

My Dad has later stage A and VD.....he lives with us.

He's not accused me of this yet but he carries the little cash he has on him.everywhere and puts it away at night. He used to.put it under his pillow but we've made a "secret place" now so it's not falling down the back of the bed!

I think he knows he's losing capacity over time and is scared of being vulnerable to both losing his money and also not be able to afford things.

You did the right thing tidying her cash up but you changed the routine and that's always a challenge, especially as she doesn't live with you so you can't nip any anxiety she seems to be having immediately in the bud. But we do have to change routines at times as its best for them.

Dad doesn't hold much in cash and everything paid out of his bank is detailed in the transaction reference. I talk to my brother about it and its so boring he rolls his eyes! But I tell him I have to so.he is fully aware.

We interpret what they do and say alongside our codes but they are not able to communicate in that way because they now think differently.

So long as Dad is safe and well cared for, I diffuse the conversation in whatever way I can to minimise his anxiety. I think that's easier with him.living here as I can understand the context of his actions and anxiety quite quickly because I can see it coming on.

On the rare occasions it isn't working, if I move him to a different room he forgets the conversation and the anxiety over the matter disappears.

For example, this morning, he was in his room in tears because he has taken our big guest bedroom and at Christmas our daughter and partner will have the small bedroom (still a perfectly fine double). He's seeing us clear it out as it's my study too and was upset at the change its imposing.

I thought that showed quite a developed cognitive understanding actually! But I asked him to.come into our bedroom and let me know if he like our new bedding and he came in and now appears to have completely forgotten the worries he had.

My dad was the same, not so much accusing my mum of taking money but a constant dialogue about making sure bills were paid, who owned the house, when the mortgage was due, need to go to the bank, where's my bank card, talking about people coming to the door looking for money (there weren't), needing to hide the money from the "bad people" even though there was never more than £50 in cash at any one time. It's exhausting.

All you can do is pacify and try to distract but I am well aware that it is not easy.