Mum refuses to sleep in her bed

[Lellyhelly]

Does anyone else have this problem? Mum is in a nursing home, moved in a few weeks ago. She sleeps in an armchair all night, she says there is a man in her bed
This is not possible, I don't know whether she really believes this. It may be that she doesn't like the hospital type bed. I have tried getting her some nicer bedding. Going to see if that works. Don't think it would be worth moving her to another room as this would probably upset her. Any ideas?

 

[Baker17]

Does anyone else have this problem? Mum is in a nursing home, moved in a few weeks ago. She sleeps in an armchair all night, she says there is a man in her bed
This is not possible, I don't know whether she really believes this. It may be that she doesn't like the hospital type bed. I have tried getting her some nicer bedding. Going to see if that works. Don't think it would be worth moving her to another room as this would probably upset her. Any ideas?

My husband sometimes sleeps in a chair where he is, don’t why he won’t get into bed but as long as he gets some sleep it doesn’t concern me too much. Do they have a recliner chair?

 

[Louise7]

Is it possible that there is a shadow of some sort that appears on the bed/in the room at night due to the light from the corridor, or even a mirror positioned in a way that makes your Mum think that there is someone else there? It might be worth closing the curtains and checking for yourself whether you can see anything that might be causing the problem. It could just be that as your Mum has only recently moved into the home the problem might go away when your Mum gets more settled and familiar with her surroundings.

 

[Lellyhelly]

Thanks for your replies
I will check for shadows. Mum has very swollen and blistered legs , so she should really be raising them when she is resting. I will ask about a reclining chair. Nice to have someone listening to me .

 

[marshal]

Thanks for your replies
I will check for shadows. Mum has very swollen and blistered legs , so she should really be raising them when she is resting. I will ask about a reclining chair. Nice to have someone listening to me .

I thought this was a problem that was just peculiar to my husband . He has been in the NH only a few weeks also. He is yet to sleep in a bed. Not once has he given in and got in bed. All day and night he just catnaps in chairs. When I have asked him why he will not get in bed he just tells me "It's not my bed". At night and most of the day he wanders up and down the rooms and corridors ,a lot of the time causing bother . He has broken things , forever moving chairs around, even the Christmas tree was a target and had to be moved. His legs and feet are swollen also. I hate the fact that he is away from me and so confused and unhappy. When I get in our bed at night I am so upset because all I can think about is him wandering and lost all night. So sorry to jump on your post and not able to offer any help or advise but when I read it I was really surprised that this "no bed" thing was affecting someone else.

 

[jugglingmum]

My mum went through a phase of refusing to sleep in her bed. She is in sheltered extra care, so in theory living independently with support. In my mum's case she lifted the mattress up, and decided she didn't like the sprung wooden top on the divan, saying that it was solid wood and too hard. Before this she loved the bed and said how comfy it was, she'd been using it about 8 months at the time, it did coincide with the change of seasons to autumn. She kept repeating this everytime we (myself and carers) spoke to her about sleeping in the bed - and it became a very fixed idea.

Whilst she wasn't using the bed she slept on the sofa in the living room, and I think did lie her body down. She did stick to a normal routine of sleeping, and only had carers for medicine prompts (not supervised to take).

She went to hospital with pneumonia late Dec, and before she returned I went out and bought a different bed. I doubt she would have remembered the bed, but thought it worth a try and she's slept in a bed ever since.

She was getting a good night's sleep as far as I could tell.

 

[Rosserk]

Does anyone else have this problem? Mum is in a nursing home, moved in a few weeks ago. She sleeps in an armchair all night, she says there is a man in her bed
This is not possible, I don't know whether she really believes this. It may be that she doesn't like the hospital type bed. I have tried getting her some nicer bedding. Going to see if that works. Don't think it would be worth moving her to another room as this would probably upset her. Any ideas?

Most care Homes will allow you to take in your own bed. Have you thought of getting her a small queen sized bed? Is there enough room in her bedroom? The care home should be doing everything they can to get your mum into bed. Try and get some bedding that might be familiar to her, buy a nice rug for the floor anything that will be familiar to her, perhaps from an earlier time in her life, my mums back in the 60s! Can you add things to her room that will remind her of home? She probably does see someone in her room, my mum has hallucinations and delusions all the time. The trick is to go along with it, say something like that mans been told he can’t come in here anymore if he does then all you need to do is tell the nurse and she will ask him to leave. That’s usually enough to pacify my mum, she sees two women who regularly steal all her things and take her money, spill drinks on the floor and more recently the pair of little monkeys broke a glass and threw water all over the floor. It’s no good trying to persuade your mum she’s mistaken she’s never going to believe you! I hope you get it sorted soon. X

 

[Rosserk]

I thought this was a problem that was just peculiar to my husband . He has been in the NH only a few weeks also. He is yet to sleep in a bed. Not once has he given in and got in bed. All day and night he just catnaps in chairs. When I have asked him why he will not get in bed he just tells me "It's not my bed". At night and most of the day he wanders up and down the rooms and corridors ,a lot of the time causing bother . He has broken things , forever moving chairs around, even the Christmas tree was a target and had to be moved. His legs and feet are swollen also. I hate the fact that he is away from me and so confused and unhappy. When I get in our bed at night I am so upset because all I can think about is him wandering and lost all night. So sorry to jump on your post and not able to offer any help or advise but when I read it I was really surprised that this "no bed" thing was affecting someone else.

Could you buy a bed for him perhaps a small queen sized one, the care home should allow that if he is mobile and doesn’t need a special bed. I hate hospital beds too! Buy some bedding similar to at home. Have you any things in your bedroom that would be familiar to him that you could take in, cushions throws, pictures of you? X

 

[Toony Oony]

Hi - no solutions but just throwing a couple of my experiences in the mix:

• @Louise7 has a good point about shadows. My Mum has a large flat screen TV attached to the wall in her CH room opposite the head of the bed. She thinks the reflections are real people.
• a while back, Mum wouldn't go to bed and slept in her recliner chair. She seemed to think if she laid down in bed she would die in her sleep.

 

[Adam51]

Does anyone else have this problem? Mum is in a nursing home, moved in a few weeks ago. She sleeps in an armchair all night, she says there is a man in her bed
This is not possible, I don't know whether she really believes this. It may be that she doesn't like the hospital type bed. I have tried getting her some nicer bedding. Going to see if that works. Don't think it would be worth moving her to another room as this would probably upset her. Any ideas?

 

[Adam51]

Does anyone else have this problem? Mum is in a nursing home, moved in a few weeks ago. She sleeps in an armchair all night, she says there is a man in her bed
This is not possible, I don't know whether she really believes this. It may be that she doesn't like the hospital type bed. I have tried getting her some nicer bedding. Going to see if that works. Don't think it would be worth moving her to another room as this would probably upset her. Any ideas?

My Mum also doesn’t sleep in her own bed sometimes, saying there are people in it. Hallucinations are a symptom of Alzheimer’s and they can be very real to the person, my mum gets very upset when the ‘visitors’ as she calls them don’t respond. It is quite a distressing side affect for everyone involved. My mum still lives in her own home.

 

[William Rodriguez]

I think this refusal to go to bed for one reason or another is quite common, it certainly doesn’t help their own conditions and obviously causes distress for those around them. My mum would stay in her arm chair stating she wasn’t tired only napping from time and could be left there for days at a time until we insisted she go to bed. No we’re more on top of the situation with routine etc but we still have the occasional blip....

 

[charlie10]

Thanks for your replies
I will check for shadows. Mum has very swollen and blistered legs , so she should really be raising them when she is resting. I will ask about a reclining chair. Nice to have someone listening to me .

My FiL has peripheral artery disease, and usually spends the night in his chair....he says raising his legs is painful (even tho he's been told to do that to reduce swelling). If the nurses 'forced' him to bed he would hang one leg down the side of it. Could this be your mum's problem?

 

[Lemondrizzle]

We frequently had this problem with my mother-in-law in her own house. She was adamant that there were people sleeping in her bed and she refused to go in there. With security cameras we found out she was actually sleeping downstairs either on the settee, a kitchen chair or even the hall telephone table. The carers told us this was very common.

 

[goldie2203]

My Mum won't sleep in a bed either. Part of it is phycological for my Mum i think, as Mum hasn't slept in a bed in over 30 years. She has pressure sores, her lower back hurts and has now very sowllen legs. She won't even put her legs up. She is in so much pain and hardly sleeps, and still refuses to go into the bed even though it would releive her pain when laying sideways. I am worried she will end of back in the Hospital

 

[silkiest]

Hi @goldie2203, my MIL sleeps in a bed but would only put her feet on a very low stool in the day and her legs were very swollen. I had to dispose of this stool to get her to use a higher one - she was very unhappy and complained a lot but it helped.
Could you replace the chair she sleeps in with a reclining one that raises her feet - it may help a little.

 

[goldie2203]

Hi @goldie2203, my MIL sleeps in a bed but would only put her feet on a very low stool in the day and her legs were very swollen. I had to dispose of this stool to get her to use a higher one - she was very unhappy and complained a lot but it helped.
Could you replace the chair she sleeps in with a reclining one that raises her feet - it may help a little.

Hi Silkiest, thank you for replying. Mum sleeps in a recliner which raises her legs. but she says she can't sleep with her legs up. She sleeps with her top part of her body bent forward. She has copd, so reclining back effects her breathing.

 

[silkiest]

oh dear @goldie2203, having COPD as well makes it difficult. Are the district Nurses or intermediate care staff involved - they may be able to advise or supply suitable bedding, especially as she has a pressure sore. If she has regular carers a visit to try and get her to bed may help, sometimes our loved ones listen more to outsiders.