Cruel calls

[Supersimkin7]

DDP (dearest dementee parents) have taken to ringing nearest and dearest with convincing - really, coherent and plausible - ‘prank’ early morning announcements that one or other of our beloved cousins has died horribly.

Still shaken after this morning’s call.

Two cousins are very sick, so DDPANBU, and the others get a car crash or a cardiac. All untrue.

I can’t even talk to the cruel old couple. But I do. Nicely. Kindly. I give them
treats.

Please say anything cheering. Are other DDP as wicked as this?

?

Can you, and anyone else who gets the calls, just not answer? If it's early morning then block calls before a certain time?

You say they've got form for this sort of behaviour - in which case, you should adopt "the boy who cried wolf" approach - simply assume everything they tell you is a lie until you can prove otherwise.

Why can't you talk to the rest of the family? Just tell them that the couple have been caught out lying yet again.

Thanks, both, that’s a really good idea. I’ll only turn the phone on after breakfast.

My mother died of dementia. It was hard when she stopped recognising us. When she refused to believe that I was her daughter. When she claimed that someone in the road had stolen her daughter and I was pretending to be her.
She claimed that people were living in her house and stealing her food. That my uncle, long dead, was having loud parties each night so that she couldn't sleep. She told me that my darling, dearest sister was beating her black and blue ( no bruises)
She truly believed all of the nonsense she told us. It was easier to promise to fix the problems and reassure her.
Then she stopped talking and babbled noises.
I really, really loved my mother but it was undoubtedly a release when she died.
Dementia is the cruellest disease. The person you have loved all your life gradually disappears.
It is so unsettling and upsetting.

I don't think some posters understand that dementia sufferers truly believe these terrible stories

Surely if they have done this before, you would know from experience that they are lying? Can’t you just tell them that you know they are lying and you’re not prepared to listen to it anymore, and hang up?
I think you should talk to another family member so you aren’t on your own with this bizarre behavior.

@Nevernottrying
My poor MIL in her late nineties used to get so confused about who was dead and who was still alive. She was distraught one day because she believed my SIL, her daughter, had died. We got my SIL to phone her straight away but she couldn't hear and was stricken with such grief that it was painful to watch.
It is like being in the Matrix. How do they know what is true or not true?

My FIL would rage about all the food that had been thrown on the floor and bark at us not to walk through it but to clear it up. The floor was immaculate, nothing there.

Not really. It sometimes helps to joke about things as in if you don’t laugh you’d cry ( or is that just us northerners ?)

I have known this twice, both times with degenerative brain conditions, one a tumour, the other Alzheimer's. One walked out a shop and claimed she had just been told that her son had died. I believe she hallucinated. The othet told people she was being beaten by her gentle husband and poisoned by him. It was awful, but in the moment, she believed it. She was calling him Dr Crippen! Thankfully, she went into a nursing home shortly after.

I would be extremely surprised if they realisecwhat they're doing, but if it is a part of their personality it will be exaggerated.

I stronglyadvise you not to cut them off, they are incredibly vulnerable, but you need help too.