Old age or more (again)

[difsa]

I know this is quite a common thread, so sorry for adding another, but keen to get others' insight. My mum is in her mid 70s, and over the last couple of years (and particularly the last few months) we've become increasingly worried about her. She's always had some physical health problems, which have caused her quite a lot of upset, but we're now increasingly worried that she might have the start of dementia.

She's always been quite repetitive, for years - she has favourite stories that she likes to retell, even if she half knows you've heard them before - but recently this has become more pronounced. There are now stock anecdotes that she'll tell over and over again, sometimes twice in the same phone call. More generally, her memory seems to be deteriorating - and she's worried about this herself. She's gone from forgetting the name of an actor or a restaurant for example (which I already do in my 40s!) to sometimes forgetting quite common words - so recently she's referred to 'that place where you get the money' (bank) or 'that meat that we had for dinner' (chicken). I always thought dementia started with short term memory loss, but just recently she's forgotten some quite 'old' stuff. The other day she told me that she'd been half way through cooking an old favourite recipe, and she couldn't remember what to do next. Then today she forgot the date of my sister's birthday, and also totally forgot about a hobby that she used to do earlier in her life.

The other change is that she's become less sociable, almost to the point of agoraphobia. Covid hasn't helped here, but she's stopped doing the hobbies she used to do, and seems very stressed by any social engagement. She's becoming increasingly anxious, and has had a few panic attacks. She's also unduly worried by administrative and financial matters, such as getting work done on the house (even though it's my dad who's organising it) or having a new bank card.

I'm just not sure what to think. Lots of conversations with her are totally normal, but various things have set alarm bells ringing, and I just think there might be more going on.

Thanks for reading my long post. Anyone had similar experiences and have a view?

She needs to speak to the Dr.
Memory problems and confusion in older people could be anything from Vitamin B12 or Vitamin D deficiencies as much as it could be Alzheimer’s.
She will need blood tests to rule out easily treatable causes and a referral the memory clinic for assessment.

Yes, she needs to talk to doctor. She also needs to give someone Power of Attorney while she is still capable of making that decision.

My mum had similar symptoms and it was a rare type dementia. I knew something was wrong but it easy subtle in the early stages, mostly she seemed fine. First symptoms were her being less “nice”, I don’t know how else to describe it. Just becoming more selfish and uncaring. And language difficulties, forgetting words. Using thing to describe everything. And becoming much less capable. Able to cook simple things, but not a roast dinner for example. Making mistakes with train bookings, turning up late or really early (she couldn’t tell the time)
I didn’t know there was such a variety of dementia related illnesses. It’s not all about short term memory loss.
I hope it isn’t that, but best to get it checked it out with the GP. And yes to the LPOA. Insight and capacity can reduce quickly, and it’s a good thing to have anyway just in case.

Luckily my dad has recently sorted out for us to have LPOA for both of them, so that's in progress - just waiting for the finance one to come through. @Candleabra sorry for your situation, but that's interesting, my mum has also become a bit less 'nice', particularly towards my dad (I think she sometimes gets confused over things he has or hasn't said or done, or she thinks he's made a bad decision when it's more her own judgment that's off). I agree, we need to get her to the doctor - that's not an easy conversation to have, but at least if there are possible causes other than dementia (even if they're less likely), then it might be easier to persuade her to go.

I had this with both parents. Women can sometimes present slightly differently from men with Dementia and one of the symptoms is that they do tend to lose their language sooner than men.

My Mum started to show these symptoms very early, she also had other health problems we didn't realise.

My Dad showed more signs of not being able to process, instructions.

But with both, it was very difficult to get them to go to the doctor. In the end with my Dad, my brother just booked the appointment and told him he was going.

@Oopsilot is right it could be so many things but whatever it is the quicker she can be tested and diagnosed the better. With Dementia the medication does help to slow down the progress.

Also, bear in mind memory clinics are overflowing so at the moment appointments are taking a long time to come through so the sooner you start the process the better.

This is the awful part of being an adult you don't realise it until you come to it but I am afraid you have to get tough and be the lead in this whether she wants you to or not.

My heart is with you, my brother and I would take it in turns to have these difficult conversations and then go to a different room to have a cry but it needs to be done.