My mum was diagnosed earlier in the year with early stage Alzheimers and is on Donepezil.
Myself and my wife and son moved in with her last year, to help us (as I have a long term health condition and lost my job due to ill health) and to help Mum. My Dad died 2 years ago.
My brother lives a long way away and does visit occasionally and my Mum turns into a different person when he is here and he whisks her off all over the place to shops and restaurants. Then he leaves and she is back on the floor. My brother does not see her day to day behaviour. She puts on a face for him and on the phone and doesn;t really understand what we are going through.
Most of the time she retreats to her room and I often find her wrapped in a blanket lying on her side. This can be any time of day.
She has gradually stopped all her activities and hobbies over the last few years and avoids social situations, even to the extent where she did not contact her best friend for months while she was being treated for cancer.
the last few weeks have been much harder and I am often greeted by being told to leave her alone as she is down. I have tried talking to her, but she tells me to not worry, but I obviously can't stop worrying. She is often distant and not with it.
Everything I suggest as an activity she has an excuse for not doing, from saying the weather is too bad to do gardening (when it really isn't), to not wanting to go for walks, to ringing friends. We will often arrange to take her out somewhere with us but will make up an excuse not to get involved at the last minute. I have suggested she has a holiday with my brother, but she says the journey is too far.
We are getting to the end of our tether and I am worried about the effect it is having on my wife and my son as well as me, as it is dragging us all down. We feel trapped now, as she would have zero interaction if we weren't here and certainly would not eat properly, but it feels like something is about to pop!
Really don't know what to do.
Myself and my wife and son moved in with her last year, to help us (as I have a long term health condition and lost my job due to ill health) and to help Mum. My Dad died 2 years ago.
My brother lives a long way away and does visit occasionally and my Mum turns into a different person when he is here and he whisks her off all over the place to shops and restaurants. Then he leaves and she is back on the floor. My brother does not see her day to day behaviour. She puts on a face for him and on the phone and doesn;t really understand what we are going through.
Most of the time she retreats to her room and I often find her wrapped in a blanket lying on her side. This can be any time of day.
She has gradually stopped all her activities and hobbies over the last few years and avoids social situations, even to the extent where she did not contact her best friend for months while she was being treated for cancer.
the last few weeks have been much harder and I am often greeted by being told to leave her alone as she is down. I have tried talking to her, but she tells me to not worry, but I obviously can't stop worrying. She is often distant and not with it.
Everything I suggest as an activity she has an excuse for not doing, from saying the weather is too bad to do gardening (when it really isn't), to not wanting to go for walks, to ringing friends. We will often arrange to take her out somewhere with us but will make up an excuse not to get involved at the last minute. I have suggested she has a holiday with my brother, but she says the journey is too far.
We are getting to the end of our tether and I am worried about the effect it is having on my wife and my son as well as me, as it is dragging us all down. We feel trapped now, as she would have zero interaction if we weren't here and certainly would not eat properly, but it feels like something is about to pop!
Really don't know what to do.
