Alzheimer's Disease Support Group
Alzheimer's disease (AD) is the most common cause of dementia and characterized by progressive cognitive deterioration with declining activities of daily living and neuropsychiatric symptoms or behavioral changes. An early symptom is memory loss (amnesia), usually manifesting as minor forgetfulness that becomes pronounced with illness progression, with relative...
my mom has started seeing people who are not there. My father is the only person in the house with her. But yet she tells me there is another man at their house. I am almost positive it's just the Alzheimer's working but is so sad that I cannot help her. I am just venting it scares me a lot. Any comforting words would be appreciated
I know how scary it can be for someone you love to see people and things that are not there. My Dad used to do that all the time. At first we tried to reason with him and convince him that it wasn't true, but of course that didn't work. My husband took a different approach, he would follow through with Dad as if the person was real and do and say things like, "I am going to call the police and have them come and arrest this person." He would pretend to call and then wait a little while and tell Dad that they had come and taken that mean old person away. It seemed to work, at least for that event. In a clear moment my Dad would ask me how his hallucinations could seem so real. Must be scary for them too.
Best of luck, dear and hugs.
Jim's brother, who was 85 and probably had some dimentia, was living with his daughter.
One night she put him to bed and left the room. He immediately started yelling for her to come back. She went into the room and he said, "there is a man in here." She tried to convince him there wasn't, but he insisted. She said, "OK, where is he?" He said, "At the foot of my bed and he waves to me all the time and I'm damn tired of waving back to him."
She looked where he was pointing, and on the wall was A MIRROR. He had gone to bed every night and waved to himself. She removed the mirror and all was well.
On another note, Jim used to think there was another person in the room and threatened to shoot them. That's when I had the guns removed from the bedroom.
I think mirrors have a lot to do with their thoughts of "someone" in the house. They don't recognize themselves in the mirror, or at least, Jim didn't.
Best of luck hardycat and take notice of when she sees other people; it might just be the mirror.
Love you all
Mary
The mirrors is a good thought. Interestingly they say cats can't recognize themselves in the mirror. They see something but can't process the idea that it is them. Guess it takes a higher brain function.
on a car ride with them ?
I don't know if Ron ever saw people, but he sure looked in the mirror like he didn't know who was looking back. He would smile,nod, wave and point to the guy in the mirror.
Carl was only that way in the hospital while on haldol and some other stuff, but what he saw was so real to him and very frustrating. He saw little girls standing in the open window and wanted me to get them before they fell. He saw a fire in his room, he saw cows stampeding towards us. All very scary stuff for him and us because nothing worked to calm him. Most of this was while he was in ICU.
I do know that it is worthless to try an convince them otherwise. I agree it is best to say you will take care of it and try to change the subject.
hugs. Carolyn