How can I support my dad?

Mairs

Registered User
Jun 4, 2010
2
0
london
Hello Everyone, I am Mairs and my mum has alzheimers and I am doing quite a lot of phone support for her as she forgets stuff all the time. She is in a great nursing home which is part of a community for older people. My dad lives there too in a seprarate flat - where they both used to live when she was less confused. She is pretty angry about this arrangement and confused and thinks he should be doing more to get them back together. She misses him terribly.

Mum has lived her life as a caring woman always with time to help and support others. She has supported my father in his work which is people orientated. Since the alzheimers, it is as if the top has come off the bottle and it is my father who is getting most of the flack! They are both very different types of people and now Mum is bringing up all the things that she has never said to Dad, things that have been hard for her but she did not speak of. She says them over and over again and then tells him how much she loves him. Clearly these are two sides of the same love. Where once she was sweet, when she is in the "lets say it" mode, she is relentless, calling him names, swearing and it is wearing him out. He has just had a week break and is dreading going back to the front line.

Any tips about how a husband can deal with this would be gratefully received?

Thanks for reading this.

Mairs :)
 

MJW

Registered User
Sep 24, 2009
154
0
East Sussex
Dear Mairs,

Thank you for raising this issue. There seem to be two schools of thought on TP: one which says people with dementia say things they don't mean, and the other that says the unspoken truth comes out when a person loses their inhibitions. For what it's worth, what follows is my view.

Depending on the nature of the "accusations", probably only your father knows whether there is any truth in them, or whether your mother is somehow projecting her imaginings or observations onto him (for example, does she accuse him of behaving in a way that her own father treated her own mother?). If the latter, then I hope your father will be able to see that it is just the illness talking, and the abuse is not really directed at him, however painful it feels. Perhaps you could make a joke of it and say she is shouting at her "other husband" again - like children have an imaginary friend who gets the blame for being naughty.

Sometimes we all want to say things to people, but we keep our mouths shut and the thought in our heads so as not to cause offence or get into trouble. People with dementia don't do this: they often forget how to be tactful and lose the ability to see things from the other person's perspective.

If your mother's remarks have any truth in them, I suppose your father has the choice of either listening or leaving the room. Maybe he believes he is entirely innocent: maybe he knows he is not. Whether your father is able and willing to face up to what might be the unpleasant truth, I have no way of knowing, but I do know that listening to my own mother finally telling me things that have long been unsaid has, in a way, been a liberating experience. The veneer has gone and I see her, and our relationship, for what it really is: and it seems better to understand this now than to carry on never knowing the truth, or the person behind it.

Bertolt Brecht wrote a poem containing the line "together in the darkness, but also in the light". He was describing a couple who were both physically passionate but also inseparable, who went through hardship together but could face - literally - the light, the truth, and the pleasure of day. I think he was also talking about the light and dark of life and death.

You say your mother also tells your father that she loves him, and this is not incompatible with telling him the truth, and may even be a definition of it. They are, if you like, seeing each other as they really are and as they really feel about each other, with all the social norms and niceties taken out. To accept and acknowledge that the person we love is not perfect, to acknowledge our own anger or disappointment, but to continue to love them anyway, is a very powerful thing. I'd say that, even if your father does feel a little remorse, he is a very lucky man to have been loved his whole life, for himself, no matter what his failings may have been. Maybe that is some comfort.
 

lizzieallan

Registered User
Jul 23, 2010
1
0
Lingfield Surrey
Dear Mairs,

Thank you for raising this issue. There seem to be two schools of thought on TP: one which says people with dementia say things they don't mean, and the other that says the unspoken truth comes out when a person loses their inhibitions. For what it's worth, what follows is my view.

Depending on the nature of the "accusations", probably only your father knows whether there is any truth in them, or whether your mother is somehow projecting her imaginings or observations onto him (for example, does she accuse him of behaving in a way that her own father treated her own mother?). If the latter, then I hope your father will be able to see that it is just the illness talking, and the abuse is not really directed at him, however painful it feels. Perhaps you could make a joke of it and say she is shouting at her "other husband" again - like children have an imaginary friend who gets the blame for being naughty.

Sometimes we all want to say things to people, but we keep our mouths shut and the thought in our heads so as not to cause offence or get into trouble. People with dementia don't do this: they often forget how to be tactful and lose the ability to see things from the other person's perspective.

If your mother's remarks have any truth in them, I suppose your father has the choice of either listening or leaving the room. Maybe he believes he is entirely innocent: maybe he knows he is not. Whether your father is able and willing to face up to what might be the unpleasant truth, I have no way of knowing, but I do know that listening to my own mother finally telling me things that have long been unsaid has, in a way, been a liberating experience. The veneer has gone and I see her, and our relationship, for what it really is: and it seems better to understand this now than to carry on never knowing the truth, or the person behind it.

Bertolt Brecht wrote a poem containing the line "together in the darkness, but also in the light". He was describing a couple who were both physically passionate but also inseparable, who went through hardship together but could face - literally - the light, the truth, and the pleasure of day. I think he was also talking about the light and dark of life and death.

You say your mother also tells your father that she loves him, and this is not incompatible with telling him the truth, and may even be a definition of it. They are, if you like, seeing each other as they really are and as they really feel about each other, with all the social norms and niceties taken out. To accept and acknowledge that the person we love is not perfect, to acknowledge our own anger or disappointment, but to continue to love them anyway, is a very powerful thing. I'd say that, even if your father does feel a little remorse, he is a very lucky man to have been loved his whole life, for himself, no matter what his failings may have been. Maybe that is some comfort.

I am Mair's father. You are not married to someone for 58 years without their knowing your failings and being hurt by them. Of course my wife's allegations which are all about attitudes rather than actions have some truth in them and I have acknowledged that to her. What hurts is the relentless, bitter anger with which she makes them which nothing I can say or do seems to assuage and this ranting harridan is totally different from the woman I have known and loved for a lifetime and I find it hard to think that the new T has anything for me but contempt and mockery. Fortunately the switch flicks back sometimes and the the one I have always known is back.
 

florence43

Registered User
Jul 1, 2009
1,484
0
London
Dear Mair,

I just wanted to send you and your dad my support at a difficult time. It must be heartbreaking to see the changes in your mum, and how wonderful that you and your dad are working closely together to get through. My dad always struggled to understand mum's "ways". He kept saying it was old age, but then dad had a stroke he was left bed-bound and paralysed down his right side. For 2 and a half years he had to live with mum as her condition deteriorated. Dad's life was rubbish. Mum's life was rubbish. They both had to endure each other and each others illness. Dad had the mind, but not the body and mum was the opposite. It was a sad and horrible situation. However between some of the most distressing situations, my sister & I witnessed true love. Just a simple hand-hold, a look, a smile. 45 years of marriage made the intolerable...possible. They were brave, unlucky but a huge inspiration to us.

I think your dad shows the same resolve. 58 years, in sickness and in health...

My mum has dementia and hasn't really spoken much sense, if at all, the last 3 years and I miss hearing her voice. When her speech started to go, we noticed inappropriate answers (in the grammatical sense) to our questions, and a trance like look in her eyes during conversations. Now she doesn't say a word.

I wish I could hear her voice. I'd love her to say my name. I'm not, of course, saying I'd rather she hurled abuse at me! Thankfully, she is very placid and unassuming in her illness. I suppose I'm just saying I understand & empathise with you both. Any changes are hard to cope with.

This illness is hard to cope with.

I can't offer any advice as such on your particular post, just support and a good ear for listening!

Keep posting. I hope it will help!

Love
Annie x
 

PostTenebrasLux

Registered User
Mar 16, 2010
768
0
London & Oxford
Dear Mairs and LizzieAllan
what beautiful posts, what a bond, what hurt.
I admire you both and know that you'l find your own answers. Just so damn tough and no real solution other than the fullness of time.
Best to you both - and welcome to Talking Point.
Martina
 

Mairs

Registered User
Jun 4, 2010
2
0
london
Thank you

Dear MJW, Annie and Martina and Dad!

Thank you for such caring and supportive responses. I find it very helpful that this deeply sensitive and painful situation is one that other carers have been through, though the role of the carer is clearly so different from being the one "in it".

The most difficult thing for me is that my mother is very able to understand what is going on - we can talk through the "ouch" stuff, get it more in place - but then it is forgotten - as if not said - so we are back to square one. I am hoping that if we keep going long enough, something of the feeling will remain from the conversations I have with her which might just enable her to make the best of the time she has in the here and now, Maybe wishful but worth trying.

Really appreciate the support and thank you.

Mairs:)
 

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