Has anyone experienced this?

[Grommit]

Thursday night last week, about 3 pm, Jean woke and became very disturbed.

Shouting loudly. I thought it was a nightmare so I spoke to her and made sure she felt safe and awke.

A few minutes later she started shouting again and violently hitting herself across the wrists and and arms.

The language she was using wwas not repeatable and, had i been hitting her as hard as she was hitting herself, I would have been causing considerable pain

Does anyone else experience this? Is it perhaps just a one off or are there cases where it recurrs n a regular basis?

 

[jcr1976]

scary

Hi grommit,

my mum hasnt done this that im aware of but she does still live in her own home all be it only next dor to me. just wanted to drop a quick reply to you so ya knew your thread was showing and to say this must be quite scary to witness... if shes doing it out of stress and agitation maybe look into getting her a stress ball then if she does it again put it in her hand and tell her to squeeze.. i know this might be a totally pointless reply but thought id just reply .

love n best wishes to you and yours

julia
carer and daughter of mum diagnosed aged 56 with ftd in sept 2008

 

[Grommit]

Thanks for the response Julia.

It does not look as though anyone else has come across this.

I am now wondering if it is related to something else other than Alzheimers.

Something deeper and more disturbing.

 

[Helen33]

Hi Grommit

Sorry for the late response but I've only just seen your thread. I have no idea what might have caused this behaviour but I just wonder whether Jean was having hallucinations (ie spiders). I suppose it's impossible to know and it will only become a big concern if it happens repeatedly. I hope not.

Love

 

[BeckyJan]

Hello Grommit:

No I have not experienced the same although David has just gone through a 'panic attach' because he had lost his car keys (his car and driving licence given up 4 yrs ago).

I do think Jean has experienced something to do with 'dementia' -each of us have different experiences and I am sorry that someone else cannot share this with you. Maybe Jean is just unique.

Do you get many of these odd behaviours?

Love Jan

 

[TinaT]

Hi Grom,

I hope that you haven't had any recurrance of Jean slapping herself about the wrists and arms. It must have been very distressing for you both.

I haven't any experience of this but when Ken is very agitated he stiffens his arms down by his sides, clenches his fists and hits himself repeatedly on the upper thighs of each leg. He also clicks his fingers when agitated - I'd rather he does this than hurt himself.

He doesn't seem to be aware that he is doing either of these things. Hopefully Jean will have no knowledge of doing this.

xxTinaT

 

[Grommit]

Jean is not aware that she is doing it.

It is distressing to see self harming violent behaviour like this, without a doubt.

This has been the first such happening. Previously she has just hit out at the table top or the bannister rail.

It has passed and it has not happened since but I will monitor the progress.

 

[Cate]

Sorry Grommit mum never did have this kind of behaviour, the closest was she would sit rocking back and forth, thumping her legs with her fists, and like most things, it passed in time. I hope this was a one off for you both, and may have been the result of a very bad dream.

Love
Cate xxxx

 

[DeborahBlythe]

Grommit, my mum tends to scratch her arms until they bleed but I think that is because of a side effect of a drug she is on: it causes itchy skin. I don't know if she does it in her sleep because I am not with her overnight.

Just as an aside, I used to share a bedroom many moons ago in my student days, with a girl who during the night was prey to the most awful nightmares. She would sit up in bed, curse and scream very loudly and thrash about. She too used foul language and almost every night I would be woken by her tirades and wild behaviour. In the morning she would have very little recall of her nightmares and would return to her normal self. Shaken to the core at first, in time I got used to her nightmares and even managed to sleep through them or at least hear them and disregard them. She was undergoing some counselling , I think and was aware that she had disturbed sleep.

I hesitate to say that Jean might simply be having a nightmare, but it's possible, I suppose. Must be frightening for you.

 

[jc141265]

Something similar

Dad doesn't hit himself, but he does yell out as if he is being murdered...possibly he doesn't hit himself as he is unable to use his arms voluntarily...he often raises them outwards as if to hit something, but as I said he can't voluntarily use his arms so not sure what he is doing with them.

Just to clarify, he does this yelling during the night when he has been asleep and he often continues to keep his eyes closed when he is yelling, so again not sure if he wakes up when he does it or whether it is a kind of sleep talking.

We have no idea why he does this, we can only guess that either he has very bad nightmares (this is a man who used to say he never had dreams at all - before the dementia) or something causes him pain...sometimes he grabs his head as well and his grip is unbelievably strong.

Sorry no answers, but just letting you know of a slightly similar behaviour.

 

[jane@hotmail]

Grommit,
My dear mum went through a stage of seeing herself in a mirror and then attacking her face, giving herself a black eye once, but usually scratching herself badly. Obviously all the mirrors had to be removed from the house and if she went to the hairdressers, she had to be angled so she couldn't see herself.
She is much further down the line with Alzheimer's now, but she has become very agitated over the last few weeks. We've had 2 nights where she hasn't slept at all, just screamed and shouted until she's made herself hoarse. The doctor decided to change her drugs, so we're in the process of doing that at the moment.

Ordinarily, Mum is usually very scared and tries to bite, scratch etc. She's also become very vocal, screaming and shouting most of the time. She swears most of the time. (she never used to swear) Lately, she's starting lifting her arms in the air, and I can't work out why.

I know this isn't the same as you're experiencing, but I think my mum has hallucinations most of the time now and this is how she reacts to them. I often wish I could see through her eyes for just a few minutes, just to understand what she's going through, but I'm sure it would not be a very nice experience.

Jane x

 

[jenny48]

Grommit
I have just read your thread and it has just occured to me that many times over the past months my mum comes to me to show a cut or bruise that has apparently just appeared, these are usually in places where she is covered, (for the want of a better term)
I am now wondering if she is self harming, I had put it down to maybe walking into things as her eyesight is quite bad but is it a possibily? I really do not know, but I will definitely be checking her cuts and bruises in future to see if they could be accidental.
The only thing is that they all seem to appear at night when we are in bed,she wanders about a lot at night, maybe I am putting two and two together and coming up with 100, my local GP is to call this week so I must add this to the list, if he has any ideas I will pass then on.

Good luck

 

[Clive]

Hi Grommit

My mum was just the opposite. She would lie in bed ramrod straight, arms straight down the side of her body. No colour in her face. Eyes could be wide open or closed.
Neither loud noise nor slight pain would make her move or react. This would continue for several hours, and then suddenly she would snap out of the condition and get up as if nothing had happened. After a few months she just stopped doing it.

Best wishes

Clive

 

[makalu]

Night terrors....

Hi everyone, my dad has similar terrors at night, its almost like hes sleep fighting with his attackers. he thrashes around breaks ornaments tries to get out the window, and had taken to keeping an axe handle under his bed. His hallucinations/nightmares whatever they are - are so vivid he recalls them in such detail, being abducted, attacked, abused very horrific stuff. One night he ended up in mums room in a manic state covered in blood after having smashed his head against the wall brandishing the axe handle. Mums destroyed the handle now, but his nightmares continue in the day and night. We think dad, 60, has Picks Disease. Final diagnosis due on WEds this week. Outlook not looking good. We were told there are drugs that can weakend the hallucinations and terrors but they are forms of sedative apparently so he would find it hard to move or get out of bed. You just cant win with this disease.

 

[chelsea]

Thursday night last week, about 3 pm, Jean woke and became very disturbed.

Shouting loudly. I thought it was a nightmare so I spoke to her and made sure she felt safe and awke.

A few minutes later she started shouting again and violently hitting herself across the wrists and and arms.

The language she was using wwas not repeatable and, had i been hitting her as hard as she was hitting herself, I would have been causing considerable pain

Does anyone else experience this? Is it perhaps just a one off or are there cases where it recurrs n a regular basis?

Hi, my dad does this all the time. He slaps himself hard on the head or bangs his hands on the wall at night. He often yells out, and repeats to himself that he is finished. I find if I comfort him by stroking his head or his arm he does often calm down. It appears to me as if he has some sort of memory coming back to his mind which triggers the behaviour.

Truthfully, I feel that we don't really know what actually goes on in the mind of someone who has dementia. Maybe they can have bursts of recent memories where they know there is something wrong with them and this causes them to get depressed and agitated? I know my dad sometimes comes out with sentences (he can't really hold a conversation these days) and the sentences are so clear that everyone around him are surprised he actually said them.