New member

[Mallard]

Hi! My Mother in law was diagnosed with mixed dementia 3 years ago. She lived alone and we managed for about 18months with 2 care visits a day and me going to see her every day and doing her shopping etc.
The inevitable happened and she had a fall and broke her hip. The medics and social workers agreed that she was unfit to return home ( which we knew but didn’t know how to tell her)
She is now in a good care home much nearer to where we live and so we can pop in and see her most days.
She was doing well but recently has begun falling asleep a lot in the day (not every day but fairly frequently). She has been checked over at the hospital including a brain scan but no evidence of a physical injury.
Has anyone else had experience of this? She falls asleep mid conversation. Is it a dementia symptom? I can’t find any mention of it in the literature.

 

[BluTinks]

No maybe stress..

 

[karaokePete]

Hello @Mallard, welcome to the forum, which I hope you find informative and supportive.

This is something that is mentioned often on the forum and my own wife will sleep a lot. In my wife’s case I think it’s a combination of the effects of medication and a progression of the dementia. A person with advancing dementia has to work hard to deal with the confusion of their world so I suppose it’s to be expected that they will get tired.

Do take a good look around the site as it is a goldmine for information. When I first joined I read old threads for information but then found the AS Publications list. If you are interested in this clicking the following link will take you there

https://www.alzheimers.org.uk/get-support/publications-factsheets-full-list

You will see that there are Factsheets that will help with things like getting care needs assessments, deciding the level of care required and sorting out useful things like Wills, Power of Attorney etc.

Now that you have found us I hope you will keep posting as the membership has vast collective knowledge and experience.

 

[Bunpoots]

Welcome from me too @Mallard

My dad had mixed dementia and, like your mum, he would sleep a lot. If he did this in the middle of a conversation I’d end up talking to myself .
I think it’s a part of the dementia. It’s mentioned a lot on here.

 

[Dunroamin]

Welcome to the forum. I was diagnosed with Alzheimers in February. Most of the time I function quite well, but like others have said it takes a lot of concentration to make sense of things sometimes. The whole thing of trying to keep up with things is very tiring for me. I often fall asleep and am tired a lot of the time. I hope this helps from one on 'the inside' as it were.

 

[Mallard]

No maybe stress..

 

[RosettaT]

Hi and welcome, my OH sleeps a lot. He's started to sleep later in the mornings until about 9.30 where as he was always up around 6am at the latest. He will fall asleep in his weetabix! However once he wakes fully he stays awake until 10pm or so but par for the course I'm afraid.

 

[Mallard]

Thank you Blutinks. This is a possibility as she has had a couple of falls recently.

 

[Mallard]

Hi and welcome, my OH sleeps a lot. He's started to sleep later in the mornings until about 9.30 where as he was always up around 6am at the latest. He will fall asleep in his weetabix! However once he wakes fully he stays awake until 10pm or so but par for the course I'm afraid.

Thank you for your reply! So it’s looking like this could be a new stage in the illness rather than a reaction to an infection (the staff have sent samples off but no Uti was found) or a result of a fall.

 

[Mallard]

Welcome to the forum. I was diagnosed with Alzheimers in February. Most of the time I function quite well, but like others have said it takes a lot of concentration to make sense of things sometimes. The whole thing of trying to keep up with things is very tiring for me. I often fall asleep and am tired a lot of the time. I hope this helps from one on 'the inside' as it were.

Thank you for your reply- that is very helpful to know as my mil would not necessarily say how she was feeling. If the doctor asks her how she is she always says ‘absolutely fine’ !

 

[Mallard]

Welcome from me too @Mallard

My dad had mixed dementia and, like your mum, he would sleep a lot. If he did this in the middle of a conversation I’d end up talking to myself .
I think it’s a part of the dementia. It’s mentioned a lot on here.

That is very interesting to hear as the staff (who are lovely) seem quite bemused by it despite 75percent of the residents having some sort of dementia!

 

[Mallard]

Hello @Mallard, welcome to the forum, which I hope you find informative and supportive.

This is something that is mentioned often on the forum and my own wife will sleep a lot. In my wife’s case I think it’s a combination of the effects of medication and a progression of the dementia. A person with advancing dementia has to work hard to deal with the confusion of their world so I suppose it’s to be expected that they will get tired.

Do take a good look around the site as it is a goldmine for information. When I first joined I read old threads for information but then found the AS Publications list. If you are interested in this clicking the following link will take you there

You will see that there are Factsheets that will help with things like getting care needs assessments, deciding the level of care required and sorting out useful things like Wills, Power of Attorney etc.

Now that you have found us I hope you will keep posting as the membership has vast collective knowledge and experience.

Thank you for your reply. I will definitely access the information you have alerted me to. It seems that within each diagnosis of dementia there are multiple differences in the symptoms each individual may have. Every day’s a school day for us at the moment!

 

[canary]

She was doing well but recently has begun falling asleep a lot in the day (not every day but fairly frequently). She has been checked over at the hospital including a brain scan but no evidence of a physical injury.
Has anyone else had experience of this? She falls asleep mid conversation. Is it a dementia symptom?

My mum used to do this in her final year.
I also noticed some of the other residents doing it too, so Im surprised that the carers are bemused by it.