imaginary people any advice about the best way to manage this?

[Lyd]

hi i am a newbie. i care for my MIL who lives 2 minutes walk away and has alzheimers. she has imaginary people:
1. small children and babies who are lost. these are very distressing for her.
2. people who live in her house these annoy her leaving things on the draining board so she cant use it. making a mess in the kitchen and dont do their share of the cleaning (LOL writing it down they should like my teenagers!)
3. a company who runs her house and come in and out as they want doing stuff (possibly when me and my other half have done things?)
my partner and i disagree how to respond. they dont want to colude i want to get a carer in and say the company sent them (she wont have a carer because she doenst need one!!!).
so any advice on imaginary people are they normal and what to do and any thing i can read.
thanks! Lyd

 

[Guzelle]

My mum used to see imaginary people it’s to go along with it or they get more confused. But you could get a carer and maybe she will think it’s one of the imaginary people. It’s worth a try.

 

[canary]

Hello @Lyd and welcome to Talking Point

My mum was another one who while she lived in her own home was conviced thatthere was aonother woman who lived there and made all the mess in her home. She also believed that there was a school upstairs and the children made a terrible racket going up and down the stairs and came in and moved everything around. In reality there was only her living in a bungalow.........

Stories like these are known as confabulations and they really and truly believe what they tell you. I once made the mistake of asking mum to show me where this staircase that the children made a racket on actually was. Mum couldnt find it and was so upset - she couldnt understand how someone could have removed it so quickly

So its no good arguing or trying to reason with them, it wont work. I found the best way was to make non-committal noises like "really?" "well, well" and "mmmm........."
Heres a link about compassionate communication that you might find helpful
https://forum.alzheimers.org.uk/thr...n-with-the-memory-impaired.30801/#post-413710

 

[Lyd]

Thanks I'll look at this. I find myself saying stuff like "well i never did" and "what a carry on" a lot! and today we went to the doctors to check if her tablets were for her (my opinion) or the little girl. Fortunately Morrisons was open even if the doctors wasnt so she checked with the customer help desk and they gave her a glass of water!

 

[Lyd]

I kinda think what can go wrong with saying "this is beth from the company shes come to tidy up".

 

[Bunpoots]

I kinda think what can go wrong with saying "this is beth from the company shes come to tidy up".

That’s pretty much what I did with my dad - and to my surprise he just accepted it. I had POA for finance so I didn’t tell him he was paying for his helper and he never asked me.

 

[Louise83]

My mum also imagines people in the house, similar to a few others it is normally kids, she told me once she thinks it is a nursery but she doesn't know where the adults are. I just go along with it, although sometimes at night she doesn't want to get into bed because she says there is someone there. I have to run my hand over the bed and show that the person has gone.

I did have to take some of bigger photos of my nieces down, as she also thought these photos were actually them being in the house.

The CP nurse said that while these hallucinations don't make her angry or distressed we just need to go along with it.

 

[Lyd]

That’s pretty much what I did with my dad - and to my surprise he just accepted it. I had POA for finance so I didn’t tell him he was paying for his helper and he never asked me.

Thank you. Thats really helpful. I think I'll try that. One of her sons is coming to visit next month and plans to tell her he has had enough and is going to put her in a home and lock her up if she doesnt have carers. She will go nuts (understandably IMHO) if he says that. I think I triggered him by asking him to look after his mum when we're away!

 

[Lyd]

My mum also imagines people in the house, similar to a few others it is normally kids, she told me once she thinks it is a nursery but she doesn't know where the adults are. I just go along with it, although sometimes at night she doesn't want to get into bed because she says there is someone there. I have to run my hand over the bed and show that the person has gone.

I did have to take some of bigger photos of my nieces down, as she also thought these photos were actually them being in the house.

The CP nurse said that while these hallucinations don't make her angry or distressed we just need to go along with it.

Thank you. Did she/he say what to do if they do get upsetting? Mostly she is fine but losing the babies or the babies dying is a common theme and she does get upset about that (to the point people who dont know her start to worry about the children). So far just telling her their mum picked them up and took them home works ok. So actually, perhaps I need to be a bit more present focused

 

[Louise83]

Thank you. Did she/he say what to do if they do get upsetting? Mostly she is fine but losing the babies or the babies dying is a common theme and she does get upset about that (to the point people who dont know her start to worry about the children). So far just telling her their mum picked them up and took them home works ok. So actually, perhaps I need to be a bit more present focused

She did mention putting my mum on antipsychotic medication if the hallucinations were seriously distressing her.
My mum is starting a new pill this week for the dementia (previous pill made things worse), and the nurse said this may help stop her imagining people.

 

[Lyd]

She did mention putting my mum on antipsychotic medication if the hallucinations were seriously distressing her.
My mum is starting a new pill this week for the dementia (previous pill made things worse), and the nurse said this may help stop her imagining people.

thanks. she's on her first week of medication and though they are not new they are more upsetting then they were and the babies/children are more of a feature. i will let her doctor know. dont think it requires antipychotic medication but they might want to think about the dementia medication.