Alzheimer’s and vascular dementia help

[Capricorn8990]

Hi all,

My dad was diagnosed with vascular dementia when he was around 78 and he's now 83, 84 in July and in January he was diagnosed with Alzheimer's.

Some of the things he has been doing recently:

He has lost his appetite. Currently on sickness tablets and doctor said it's his body slowing down.. my mum has to beg him to eat. He's on replacement meal shakes but he needs loads of encouragement to drink it.

He's started hiding his tablets claiming he's taken them.

He's got no interest in going on his laptop which he used to love.

He is swearing which is really out of character for him.

He just seems different, which I know I should have expected.

My mum is at the end of her tether. She won't accept help from carers but has accepted dementia team advice.

I'm 35 weeks pregnant and the "baby" of my mum and dad - they adopted me and I'm now 28. I feel a lot of responsibility to try and make things easier for them but need to look after myself.

I've got an older sister who is classed as his carer and 3 older brothers, 2 of which rarely bother.

How can I help my mum? How can I help my dad?

Please, any advise would be appreciated.

Is there any family member who could convince her to get outside help. I had the same scenario with my parents until my cousin spoke to DM about how good the carers were with my uncle. It made such a difference to have someone coming in each day to help out with DF.

She’s so stubborn she is so set in her ways I don’t think anyone would convince her until she’s really worn down. Nobody tends to listen to me cos of my age even though I’m an adult.. but I don’t think it would help coming from someone else

The absolute best thing for me was ringing age uk and a carers cafe. The latter might be found via the Drs surgery. I cannot stress enough how helpful age uk were in advice and support, from legal perspective, medical perspective and social and listening help. You and/or your mum will find proper help, advice and support at a carers cafe. They often have professionals give small talks, they do activities everyone can join in with it not - zero pressure, but most importantly they allow you to talk and ask question. People who go will be at all different stages of their individual journey but will be more than willing to offer practical advice. Plus the advice will be based on what is actually available in your parents area, (grants, support groups, care etc) whereas us internet people can only give more general advice!
Sorry you are going through this, but congrats on the your impending new addition to your family.

Remember - you don’t have to do this alone, neither does your mum. You can both say no and ask for help - help is out there but sometimes you do have to shout to be heard.

My DM is stubborn as a mule but there comes a stage when they eventually realise that help is needed. Could you maybe speak to the family doctor and see if they can help or convince your DM she needs assistance?

I think that what you can do is listen.

She has to decide what is to be done and to do that she might have to talk herself around.

You can't do this for her but you can be there - listening - reflecting back - perhaps questioning - summing up what she has thought.

Listening is an active thing - you would really be contributing.
It is hard thought. It is sooooo tempting to offer solutions and to try and influence the person you are listening to. Everyone else does this. Just listening is help of a different kind. Sometimes you can't know what you think unless you hear yourself say it.

Thank you to all that replied with advice. She’s got someone from the dementia team coming on Friday. So hopefully they can offer some advice. I’m going to call age UK when I’ve got the opportunity to do so.

Just feels like my dad has given up 😞