Cockroach cafe Winter 2025

[GnomeDePlume]

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/elderly_parents/5360173-cockroach-cafe-summer-2026?page=39&reply=147870717

Here we go. I think we are going to need this

So hallelujah I managed to speak to one of DFs doctors this morning. Unfortunately it wasn’t good news - the memory clinic wait list is many months - but then maybe that is good news as apparently DF managed to answer the rudimentary memory questions asked by the doctor who apparently visited on Friday. Maybe it’s a good thing - if he can scrape his way past some basic questions now maybe if we’re still in the same situation in some months time, I am pretty sure he won’t pass it then, plus he knows he isn’t allowed to drive until the assessment has taken place so we can perhaps spirit the car away. Most importantly the doctor was absolutely lovely, her DPs live about 5 minutes from us so she knows all about the hours drive to get there, and when I raised my concerns about food hygiene and DMs care she said that I should step back and allow the issues to happen.

DPs food delivery arrived today. I was expecting an irate call because I haven’t ordered three of everything, and DH had kindly offered to shield the call but instead it’s been crickets which is odd. I am sure I will pay for it soon, but I am determined to keep my equilibrium as much as possible.

@roundaboutthehillsareshiningI am glad the trip is over and no longer looming over you.
@GnomeDePlumeisn’t it sad when we are happy to merely have the tedious administration and work to do, but it’s the personalities and the deep rooted family experiences that makes this so hard.

@bigbootsweatherI have never met your DB but he sounds insufferable.

Goldenballs is still trying to issue orders from on high. My boundaries now have 10 foot walls 😁

@rookiemere he is. Periodically I start to feel sorry for him, thinking perhaps he really is just worried about his mum and trying to do what he thinks is best, however misguided. Then he acts like a selfish teenager and I remember why I only really interact with him for mum's care.

@bigbootsweather I’d have gone ballistic if I’d driven a couple of hours to find DB making himself comfortable and not doing anything useful. Especially if he’s actively making the situation more difficult than it needs to be. And then send him home for his wife to presumably do the same ear bashing for checking out of family/parental responsibilities

i do have to do all the mental load/thinking for DM, but DB is actually good at all the hands on stuff. He has cleaned up several “code browns” without fuss and said his kids had done worse. He’ll happy work through a list of things to do, he just has the annoying male habit of “not noticing” things need doing without someone else pointing it out.

...........he just has the annoying male habit of “not noticing” things need doing without someone else pointing it out

For "someone else" read "any woman" within a mile of the thing that needs doing.

Why are men wired so badly?

@bigbootsweather that does sound similar to the start of things with my DM. The auditory hallucinations, paranoia, loss of balance.

My DB didnt want to accept that DM was developing dementia. He wanted it to be something which had a cause which could be cured. He also believed DM when she said staff had hurt her (by being careless or harsh). Now dementia has been formally diagnosed he is more accepting of the reality.

I do suspect my DM's fall and resulting broken hip/leg was triggered by her dementia (quite mild at the time). Old bones break so easily. 3 months in hospital sealed the deal.

It does sound like your DM is getting worse and that she may not be safe on her own. My DB didnt want to be the one to make the difficult decisions. Eventually he had his hand forced by the hospital saying that either we sorted somewhere or social services would and that we would have no choice in where DM was sent.

@funnelfan Yes, I was not happy. But I know that if I react as I'd like to with DB he just plays the victim and mum gets really upset. In the past I'd have said her upset is on him but given mum's confusion I know I need to keep calm (another challenge!). I'm sure his partner thinks he's busy helping mum and being son of the year- but she also seems to think he can do no wrong.

@GnomeDePlume I'm sorry to hear your mum had a bad fall. If you don't mind me asking, with your mum were you told that the issues with balance were part of the dementia? Some things I've read online seem to suggest that but at the moment mum's GP seems to be treating them as separate issues, so mum's hoping that they'll find an issue with blood pressure etc that they medicate or that the right physio/tools she'll be fine. My fear is that it is part of the dementia and as such will get worse anyway. I'm expecting that the Memory Clinic will be able to give us better advice but in the meantime I'm trying to manage her expectations a bit. I think a care home is inevitable and I'd really like to make plans before things get really bad- particularly because I know she's got enough savings to have to be self funding but they won't last long at all so the house will have to be sold, which won't be easy as it's in an odd location and (although she would say otherwise) any buyer would want to do quite a bit of work on it. Currently she and DB won't even consider that as an option.

One thing I've noticed from being a step away emotionally from my situation is the amount of trauma the actual "blood family" are carrying and how their (failure in) dealing with the trauma informs how they're behaving in dealing with situations now. Not just trauma from the current situation, but having seen it spiral down for decades.

Yes @roundaboutthehillsareshiningthis is so true. A large part of the reason I find caring for my DPs is so hard is I don’t actually like my DF. He did his best as a parent but it wasn’t terribly good, I mean it wasn’t bad either but he always put himself first.
Over the years I have managed it by having a very superficial relationship with him but now, thrust into spending so much time having to placate and pacify him, it’s awful and I feel shaken after pretty much every visit.
Someone possibly @GnomeDePlumesaid that dementia amplifies the existing personality- or something like that - and it’s hard for me to separate and blame the disease when he’s always been a selfish sod.
Luckily DH is immune and because he is male DF is nicer to him, ditto DS.

@bigbootsweather my mum's falls are dementia related. She doesn't always recognise or correctly judge changes in level/uneven ground so trips frequently over steps/kerbs/ the edge of the patio etc.

Thanks @countrygirl99 I'd not thought about dementia preventing judgement of where things are in this way (it seems obvious now you've said it). That could explain why mum's 'not quite a fall' incidents always happen in the early hours, when she's probably tired and not at her best. It's also that time when the worst of her auditory hallucinations/paranoia happens so would make sense that the 2 are linked. It must be really frightening for her.

@bigbootsweather I agree with @countrygirl99 regarding falls. It is a combination of a number of dementia symptoms which can result in losing balance and falling.

Reduced mobility, poor decision making (being overly ambitious), visual and auditory hallucinations resulting in grabbing for things just out of reach.

A few months before DM broke her hip she had a fall and possibly knocked herself out because she had decided to climb on a stool to reach something. I think this was a symptom that things were starting to go wrong. Previously she would have asked DB to reach the thing down (he was already on his way over to her, 5 minutes away).

A dementia diagnosis is more one of absence than presence. There are a number of things which can have similar symptoms to dementia so it is important to rule these out.

Thanks @GnomeDePlume The more I hear of other people's experiences the more convinced I am that some form of dementia is the problem for mum. I'm sure she's been covering up her symptoms for longer than I thought. It's harder because in many ways she doesn't present in a way that seems like 'classic' dementia- she has trouble remembering words and gets names wrong, but doesn't forget where she's put things (no more than the rest of us anyway!), what she's done, who people are etc. It's much more the processing of information (eg. she knows she needs to lock the door, but can't work out how to do it) and fear (auditory hallucinations/believing that someone is in the house etc) that is causing her problems at this stage.

@bigbootsweather there are different types of dementia with different impacts. Frontal temporal lobe dementia is one that often presents with language difficulties.

Has a stressful start to the day. MIL usually goes to a dayclub on a tuesday and when we went round she was in her dressing gown and was "ill". So now we have not eating properly, not drinking water, not moving much so her mobility has got worse and no dayclub.

She did admit she wasn't ill but we can't make her go. All this because she's stressed about Christmas.

I ended up being late signing on for work and I only started this job a few weeks ago.

@StillNiceCardiganyou have to prioritise your job for sure.

I was dreading phoning my DPs, sure that yesterday’s shopping would be wrong and DF would have driven off in a temper ( he isn’t allowed to drive) and crashed into a wall. Instead he was very pleasant, enquired after me - I can’t actually reply to that one so it’s best not to - then DS which is safer ground and politely requested some more orange juice ( I am certain he has many cartons in the house so I want to check before buying loads).
Unfortunately talking to them now brings me such anxiety that it took about 2 hours of procrastination to get to that stage, plus I got the day of my haircut wrong. I hope my policy of phoning them and letting their calls go to voicemail helps.

On the dementia front, there are many presentations. It seems both of my DPs probably have it despite normal CT scans. DF is more classic with memory loss and confusion but DM is still mostly cognitively there but seems to have reverted to a more childish behaviour so loss of empathy, very intransigent and very one tracked in her thoughts. I make the mistake of treating her like she is fully aware, but really I am pretty sure she isn’t.

Just been catching up. So much resonates.
I’ve realised that while I can accept DP’s are co dependant with all that entails I can navigate that with low contact and just keeping in touch with DM via text (she has speech issues after brain bleed) and visiting every six weeks (plus DM birthday and Xmas). The one that brings the drama is DSis.

I was definitely enmeshed in it for years (knew no better) but having stepped back out of it for last few years it’s become so obvious that I’m astonished I never saw it previously.

anyway. Now I’m persona non grata again as I didn’t agree to ‘babysit’ DF later this week (came home yesterday after post op fall on Fri) but am planning to go up Friday as its first free day I’ve got.

@rookiemere i had CBT through nhs taking therapies that really helped deal with the catastrophising. There was a bit of a wait but worth it. Ultimately the main thing to really damp down the anxiety itself was medication, but the CBT techniques help spot when the feelings start and stop them spiralling out of control so they’re a bit more manageable. And I procrastinate for less time.

@bigbootsweather i was caught out by mums dementia not presenting in the way that I thought dementia presented. I always remember a poster at the GP that said “forgetting where you parked the car = normal, forgetting the colour of your car = see your GP”. Mum started forgetting where she parked her car regularly but could tell you the make, model, colour, and number plate, fine. She started talking about “my dementia” when she started losing the ability to work the tv remote, microwave, washing machine and I used to jolly her along saying she was just getting on a bit because her mother was exactly the same. But she was right and I was wrong, and in hindsight grandma probably had dementia too, but luckily for her she broke her hip and followed the hospitalisation/ infection/ pneumonia path to a relatively quick and peaceful end. In mum’s case the doctors say her head scans show signs compatible with vascular dementia, but she also has signs and symptoms that fit well with Parkinson’s and/or Lewy Body Dementia. Apparently you can only get a definitive diagnosis post-mortem, so she’s treated as if she has Parkinson’s and the medication really helps.

Thanks @funnelfanI am due to see the doctor next Monday morning so I can ask then. I did hope the HRT kicking in might help the anxiety but it hasn’t helped much yet. DH is finishing work at the end of the year and he is keen to take on the bulk of the calls and visits to reduce the impact on me, plus I will be starting a part time job in February.

The language around dementia can be unhelpful.

'Confusion', the implication being that the person will be uncertain. My DM will frequently and with confidence say that I am her sister but at the same time know my name. At other times she has said to me she wants to go home to see her children.

'Forgetfulness' isnt just forgetting who the prime minister is, it can be forgetting that spouse or parents have died. Forgetting they can no longer walk. Forgetting the start of a sentence long before the end. Forgetting they do/dont like certain foods. DM insisted she have sugar in a cup of coffee then rejected it as it had sugar in it.

'Hallucinations' arent vague, ephemeral things, they are rock solid in the person's mind.

There's some pretty compelling science that the first phase is the laying down of amyloid plaque in the neocortex, and of course as it's a relatively big space, it depends where in the neocortex the plaques are being deposited. So it can be memory, especially "working memory", or motor skills, or cognition or the visual/auditory centres (for hallucinations).

The problem is that we don't always pick up symptoms and even when we do, many people don't get a PET scan for amyloid to calculate progression of disease, they just get a diagnosis based on symptoms or a CT (which can't see amyloid, so will only show general brain shrinkage in later stages)

Thinking back mum's first signs were trouble making decisions, when she'd always been decisive, and following instructions e.g. stopping doing internet shopping as " they've made it more difficult".

It’s hard to tell which were DMs first signs. Her balance became an issue in her late 70s but since she has hydrocephalus as well as possible Alzheimer’s it’s difficult to know which caused that. Her memory loss is definitely short term and organisational. She cannot grasp anything new and anything I tell her is immediately lost. Long term memory seems fine so far. Cannot remember what she’s eaten or who visits.
I took her to lunch on Friday. Despite reminding her every day and twice on the morning she’d forgotten about it when I arrived to collect her. Halfway through lunch I got a call from her friend who had arranged to visit her at 1pm - she’d totally forgotten that too and forgotten to tell the friend she would be out.
Despite that she remembered to press the lifeline alarm this morning at 3am when she fell. All ok thankfully.

I think that what we (and the general public) need to understand is that there are many, many kinds of dementia.

And that some patients seem to develop more than one kind of dementia.

The public also needs to know that the speed of onset and that of deterioration both very greatly between one person and another.

One useful rule of thumb is that when someone on the young side (60s) develops dementia, their life expectancy is much shorter than that of an 80 year old who gets it. The 80 year old often lives for 10 years with a diagnosis, whereas the 60 year old usually lives for 3 - 5 years.

Finally, it's helpful that everyone understands that no definitive diagnosis actually can be made until the patient is dead.

It's how we respond to the individual in front of us that makes the difference, though, as we all know.