Mum cannot stop buying food

[woohoofoo]

One of the things that first told us there was something wrong with my fil (apart from the fact that he'd started to look scruffy, wasn't shaving, wearing grubby clothes etc.) was the fact that we'd find 6 or more identical packs of sausages in his fridge.

Don't know what you can do about it to be honest - once they've got to the stage where they won't remember anything you say, it's hard to prevent this sort of thing unless you take the means of shopping (i.e. cash) out of their hands. Which is not easy unless you've got P of A set up.

The six packs of sausages rang many bells!
We are sorting out POA at the moment so I said to my Dad that's it's probably a good idea to get rid of the joint acct which Mum has access to. That way we can restrict the spend a wee it. Thanks for your help x

[woohoofoo]

I think the only real option is to remove the money. If she has a card, maybe it needs to be changed to a debit card with a small weekly balance. It will be hard, because she'll probably go to the shop and get a decline, which will cause all kinds of problems in itself.

It's a tough thing to do, but she will be draining the money away on things that end up in the bin. Something that eventually needs to be done with someone with alzheimers, because they really can't be responsible for a bank account full of money, it's a recipe for disaster.

I don't envy you, and fear that is what's going to happen with my mum. She has had a fridge full of out of date food for years, when she's not around i have to sneak things into the bin on her. my mum's only outlet also is spending. they recently had their bedroom re-painted, so she had to clear out her wardrobe. boxes and boxes of brand new clothes, underwear, shoes, with tags still on. it was ridiculous. She just loves to spend money, doens't matter what on, she like to buy things. I don't know how long it's going to take for dad to remove her money, but i'm pretty sure she'll do some serious spending before that time.

Your post sounded like you could have been me in my Mums house! The clothes shopping with tags, etc is a joke! And bin bags of food being dumped every week is getting beyone a joke.
It's a spending thing that must be some sort of comfort mechanism I think. But the problem is, as much as Dad has allowed financially for their futures, I don't think this exactly factored into the equasion sadly. I think you may be right in that the only way to deal with this is to remove or restrict her access to the money. Good luck with your Mum x

[Boudeca2007]

My late Mum used to have an obsession about loo rolls and Paracetamol. Well the loo rolls wasn;t that much of a problem but the tablets definitely were as she had her full wack of these in her tablet box. We used to find them hidden behind cushions / under her pillows etc. And when she was really anxious she used to go knocking on neighbours doors wanting to ' borrow ' loo rolls even though she had enough to service an army in her own house. It's distressing and very worrying but it's hard to know what to do.

She was living alone then [ Dad had passed away 10 years before ] and we were very worried indeed about the excess tablets and she smoked back then and was stopping cars going sown her road asking for a light for her ciggie. Fate stepped in one night when the night carer found her at the bottom of her stairs with a head injury and she was taken to hospital. She never returned home and had to go into an EMI Nursing Home.

When I think about it now I don't know how we survived with our own sanity . Mum was diagnosed with Fronto Temporal Dementia and hoarding / COD symptoms are very common with this type of Dementia. She would have been horrified by her own behaviour before dementia.

I hope you can find a solution to this problem.

[Onlyme]

Mum was single handedly keeping the European butter and milk mountain in the freezer. She would ring up and ask for milk and butter, you get there and nearly get killed by the landslide of butter coming at you out of the freezer. There was probably no less than 20 pints of milk in her freezer at any one time.

As soon as food was bought it had to go in the freezer even if you wanted to eat it the next day. In the end it seemed to be some magic place where all food was found.

[Glamour Puss]

Yeap, they do not understand hygiene and bacteria. I used to cringe when Mum prepared a chicken, all that raw meat going all over the place. Now I have the money, buy the microwave food, and cook it and wash up. It's a task, but peace of mind

Wet knickers "drying" on my nice clean chrome towel rail. Faecal matter on the bath mats. God knows what on the rims on her mugs, I bleach them ! They won't change clothes, so I stick them in the washing machine overnight (she mucked about with that last night though, and denied it, and it's a brand new machine costing £500).

And you want to hear her when I try to shower her, the neighbours must think I am cruel.

Private mail if you like

[frazzled1]

hi there,

Not sure what the practical solution is apart from a smaller fridge, yes, and going to shops with a fixed amount of cash on here and no cards....its much easier to be sensible with cash than it is with plastic cards (which some people conveniently forget are money). It would help to label the compartments in the fridge, starting at the bottom, a red label for "red meat" and yellow one, say for white meat and a green one for salads and veggies, blue for frozen stuff. Bright primary colours help people with dementia to get around and associate each object in its rightful place and maybe this would help her to physically see that the compartment with such and such label on it is already full ! It worked for me, family set it up for me as i was hording stuff. I try not to do it anymore. Some people who do this are called Hoarders and the hang on to lots of stuff, papers, magazines, clothes, hardware for computers, cars, sports gear etc etc as well as food and buy duplicates of everything until it takes over their lives. The fridges overflow first, then often the wardrobes and eventually all the rooms in the house. Its linked with depression and filling an emotional "void", and a phychiatrist has to work alongside the sufferer to overcome the hoarding. That worst case scenario of course, as this is how it starts BUT i hope, for you, its just a temporary "blip" that the labelling of the fridge compartments can overcome as when things are very neatly in their place its easy to find stuff and you dont run out to buy something simply cos the place is untidy and you cant find the original item. I only managed to de-clutter my fridge after watching the TV programme called "Hoarders:Buried Alive". I was starting with this problem but now im over it and once again, everything is in order for me

[CINDYJANE]

I don't know if this would work for you but you I've started to take mum shopping on a Sunday. We go to M&S and have a coffee then go food shopping which she thinks is very important. I always tell her that I'm going anyway and that its easier if we go together. When I first started taking her I did get stressed because mum would tell the checkout lady the food didn't belong to her and she that she didn't know where it came from but now I've got it down to a fine art. Mum puts food in the trolley and when she's not looking I take it out. She can't remember what she's put in it so as long as she doesn't see me take it out it seems to work. We only buy what she needs, and we only have the odd comment at the checkout about where did those biscuits come from![/QUOTE]

My mum also wants to buy things she has lots of already, so when we go together I do the same thing as Amber- remove the items when she isn't looking. I wonder if this is the reason we come across packets put in the wrong places on supermarket shelves? !!

[Tooshie]

Wet knickers...
...Private mail if you like

PMSL!! Oh you do cheer me up. Yes PM would be great - tomorrow ? xxx

[optocarol]

] My mum also wants to buy things she has lots of already, so when we go together I do the same thing as Amber- remove the items when she isn't looking. I wonder if this is the reason we come across packets put in the wrong places on supermarket shelves? !![/QUOTE]

In future I'll be more forgiving of stuff in the wrong place! Hadn't thought of this.

[brianmtuk]

When I take my residents out into town they quite often ask 'what shall we buy for dinner?' Or request to buy food items that are already available in the care home (all their meals are cooked for them so they don't need to buy anything)

I would suggest making a list of what IS in the fridge and putting it in with the persons money. Or even take a picture of the full fridge, and put 'the fridge is full' on it in pen. That way they 'might be reminded that the fridge is full when they get to the shop and have forgotten

[Sue J]

When I take my residents out into town they quite often ask 'what shall we buy for dinner?' Or request to buy food items that are already available in the care home (all their meals are cooked for them so they don't need to buy anything)

Maybe part of the visit into the town could include buying things for dinner, surely they are just demonstrating that despite needing to be in care they still remember and have desires to do some of the things they did before that need arose? Just a suggestion, it may make there visit more enjoyable and give them some pleasure.

[brianmtuk]

We do buy bits and bobs. Buying ingredients for 70+ residents meals is a bit impractical though :-) I generally remind people that dinner is already being cooked and we get some chocolate or cheese they like instead.
My point was that it's the point at which people buy more food than needed which you are more likely to make a difference, rather than making changes at home which they are likely to forget when out shopping.