Coping with phone calls through the night

[LiteralNightmare]

If I don't answer it's worse because they'll come looking for me and wake everyone else up too.

I'm so tired, I'm not thinking straight. I've had three phone calls since midnight and 4am and it feels pointless bothering to try to get more sleep. The phone calls are about her bank accounts or hunger. I've left a basket of snacks available which has helped but the constant checking of bank accounts is driving me insane. She can no longer figure out her online banking. If I say I'll check in the morning she says ok, then rings me again in half an hour.

The GP gave her quetiapine (which worked brilliantly) but she won't take it now. I can't put it in with her regular meds because it's a half tablet and she spots it.

Even if she was in a care home it wouldn't stop the phone calls. I wish I could give someone else, just for about 5 hours, then I could cope.

I don't know why I'm writing, no one can help, I know! Cathartic I guess. I do actually feel a bit better now. Good luck, fellow travelers. ✊

My Aunt had a similar situation with my Uncle and he'd get up and wander downstairs and telephone all and.sundry during the night. Sounds drastic but she had no option to lock him in the bedroom (was en suite), she'd sleep next door and if he needed her she'd hear him. Eventually he went in to residential care but it was the most horrible thing she'd ever had to do. Sounds like you aren't able to do this so ask social services for some help, or her GP to arrange a referral for an assessment. I know first hand how tough it is but please don't think you're alone or make yourself ill in the process!😘HUGS

They'd have to do a capacity assessment around having her phone at night and it would be added as a restriction to the DoLS.

When my DP was ill in hospital and very delirious he started ringing me repeatedly during the night. The nurses did take his phone from him. They rang me and put him on the phone to me when he took his nighttime meds or if anything happened during the night - eg if the doctors came to see him. But otherwise they just reassured him that I’d be in in the morning. It was a blessing for me that they did this because I was becoming ill from exhaustion.
I’m very sorry you are going through this OP. Is it possible to even give yourself a few hours during the night when you are uncontactable? Even knowing you can get 4-5 hrs uninterrupted rest makes a big difference. Would she listen to your reasoning re the quetiapine? I know I told my DP that if hr didn’t take his medication it would end up making me ill too and he accepted this and took it.

If she was in a care home you could put your phone on silent at night, in the knowledge that she was safe. You need to start the process.

OP could take the phone though. There is no need for it if she is being taken care of.

Having been here, you have my sympathy. It’s very difficult and absolutely exhausting. If I were you I’d start to get the legal elements in place now whilst there is still some capacity and then look at additional support/homes as from experience this is the point which it’s really needed for her own safety as well as your sanity.

ok. It sounds like she isn't competent and its time for someone to take control. have you spoken to her GP and will he discuss stuff with you?

As a night care home worker I can tell you we would take the phone away if she was doing this.

If you know she’s safe and the calls won’t be of anything urgent just put her on do not disturb at night.

Does this help? Depending on her dose there may be a lower dose available without halving the tablet. Or a slow release one.

Standard quetiapine tablets come in strengths of 25mg, 100mg, 150mg, 200mg and 300mg. The slow release tablets come in strengths of 50mg, 150mg, 200mg, 300mg, 400mg and 600mg. The liquid contains 20mg of quetiapine in 1ml.

Is she lucid enough to explain why she won’t take the tablet? Seems like that would be the answer to your problems with her so far.
what happens if you tell her if she won’t take her medicine you won’t help her. Could that make her change her mind?

If she was in a care home, it would solve the problem. As a PP said, they could ensure she took her meds.

And it opens up other options. The OP could remove her mother's mobile phone. My mother never had her mobile phone when she was in the care home, she didn't need it. Or the OP could simply block the calls, because there would be no danger of her mother coming to look for her.

OP your mother is extremely anxious when she's alone. She would probably be a lot less anxious in a care home because there would be people around to reassure her all the time. I hope you have LPA for her.

When parent was in care home she had a mobile phone but kept forgetting how to use it and I didnt charge it up so it was never working. I took it away to try and ‘fix’ it and she just forgot about it. We did put a landline in her room but tbh on reflection I wouldn’t have done that if I had the choice again.

Care homes are used to this sort of behaviour and won’t let one of the residents make endless calls like this.

@PropertyD I completely agree with your post. When your relative is in a care home it is fairly easy to avoid this type of behaviour. I would have done the same as you, and taken the phone to 'fix it' if necessary, but fortunately my mother could not remember how to use her phone by that point.

I hear you! Phone ringing 11.30 pm asking for some cream to stop itching. Call at midnight, have you a knee bandage. Call at six am when are we going for my shopping? Call at 10.30 am dr said can you take me to hospital. Call at 9.30pm can you collect your neighbour from an and e. Call at 6am can you take the gent across the road to the drs. All from different callers.
I am not sure how or why I have been nominated as the emergency (not normally a real emergency) for my parent and their neighbours but also my own neighbours.
I am afraid of switching my phone off in case I miss a real request or dare I even suggest it a social invitation for ME!
jiggered but no advice. Good luck.

But if they don't have capacity they can hide the tablets in food, with a proper assessment by professionals. Not to be attempted at home without an assessment by relevant parties.

I was LPA which helped but there is no way the care homes that both parents went to would allow their residents to do what they liked because they had ‘capacity’.

They can do, it has been done in the case of our relative.

If they are in a home also, you can and may have to block her number, and just check in with her at normal times. We have all had to do this as much of the family (and friends) were getting constant abusive phone calls in the middle of the night, and it was having serious consequences for people.

It sounds from what you are saying that she is getting to a point at which a home may be the only option care wise anyway?

Sympathy OP, it is awful.

wtf? Your parents, ok, but neighbours? No. I’d be saying no, quite simply. They’ll have their own family members who are getting off lucky here by the sounds of it.

Correct. However the lady in question has no diagnosis of dementia so would be regraded as having capacity until she was diagnosed. Then they would have to have a meeting to decide whether to use covert medication.

@SooticaTheWitchesCat what makes you say she has no diagnosis? The OP does not say that, and she has posted on the dementia forum.

In order for the OP's mother to move to a care home she would have to be deemed to have no capacity so that someonelse (the OP/social worker) could make that decision. Otherwise she won't be in a care home as it is vanishingly unlikely the mother would volunteer for it.

This

Why is she constantly trying to check her accounts?

If she still has access and control of her money, the could go very wrong, very fast

Give her the full tablet.

If it is dementia, as per the titie, some elderly people have been know to accuse family members of stealing their money and/or start hiding if all over the house, to keep it safe. None of it is rational.

Not everyone in a care home has no capacity.
I thought I read she did not have a diagnosis but maybe I am wrong.