Dementia and dreams

[Auntiep]

This might be obvious, but is there a link between morning confusion and dreams?

My mum is always very disorientated in the morning, and doesn't know where she is. She often talks about people and places she's seen in the night, but I wonder if she's thinking her dream is reality?

Any thoughts?

P x

 

[Spamar]

OH often like that. I call it dawn- downing. Unfortunately he often has sundowning as well!

 

[CJinUSA]

Hello. My mother will sometimes have delusions during the night. She has fewer, now that her Alz has progressed. I would sometimes go and find her looking for something in her bed. One night she was looking for a person inside one of her drawers (where we keep clothing and a person could not have fit). For a time, she was having nightly delusions that her brother (a brother the very large family lost track of) was calling to her through the night and she had to get to him. That last was a hard time. She could not shake it. Now, though, she is much calmer through the night, and on occasion she can make it through a whole night without a sound or having to get up to toilet. The dreams of people in her situation might have greater feeling of reality. To be sure, I have pretty real dreams sometimes, too!

 

[WGA]

Well put it this way... I walked into the living room this afternoon to see dad just waking up from a nap. And he was at dog races and his dog was winning. And the other morning he was trying to escape from prison....

 

[Ann Mac]

Hi.

I recently posted about the problems my poor Mil was having with very vivid and scary dreams. Some mornings she would be initially upset, very confused and agitated - but within an hour or so, she had completely forgotten the dream and would say that she had 'slept well, all night'.

Other mornings were a very different story. She would usually recognize that she had had a 'nightmare', but very quickly she could become convinced that it was an actual event/situation, and not a dream, that she had experienced. When this happened, we could get full days where her agitation and confusion were much worse - she would be tearful and very fearful all day. And her conviction that the 'nightmare' was a reality was impossible to shake. It caused her a hell of a lot of distress - I have seen her stood, peeping through the curtains, looking for the dragons that had been chasing her the night before. And I've had days where she has begged me repeatedly not to send her 'back to that awful place', that she had (she believed) spent the previous night in

I spoke to her CPN, just before Christmas, both about the 'dreams', and because she - even on days where there had been no nightmares - seemed very 'low'. The CPN recommended an anti depressant, that also was very effective as a sleep medication, and for about 2 - 3 weeks, I think, we had no dreams. Then they crept back, worse than ever, and the CPN said she felt that they were not 'dreams' as such, but probably hallucinations (which Mil has regularly throughout some days, though the 'waking ones' rarely seem to stress her out at the moment). The CPN recommended increasing the anti depressant dosage - which we did, and so far, no dreams - but there is a likelihood that the anti depressants will become less effective as her condition deteriorates - and there comes a point where you can't increase the dosage anymore.

I don't know from your post if the extent of the confusion your Mum is having after dreams is bad enough for you consider talking to your GP/CPN, but I guess its there as an avenue for you to explore if you need it. I hope it reassures you at least to see that quite a few dementia sufferers have experienced this - I often finds it helps to know others have had similar experiences x

 

[Raggedrobin]

mum has some awful nightmare dreams that seem real to her, she sort of can't wake from them, But at the moment she is a downhill ski champion, inspired by watching the olympics.

 

[Witzend]

mum has some awful nightmare dreams that seem real to her, she sort of can't wake from them, But at the moment she is a downhill ski champion, inspired by watching the olympics.

My mother had one dream that truly did turn into a nightmare. I knew it had been triggered by something on Who Do You Think You Are? the night before - there was something about an ancestor who had been a pauper being buried in an unmarked grave somewhere abroad.

She woke in the night in a terrible state, convinced that she and her lovely cleaning lady had taken my father's dead body in the cleaning lady's car to a graveyard miles away and just dumped it. He had died many years previously - I had been there at the time, I was there when the undertakers took him away, I was there at the funeral (cremation). Of course none of this helped - she was utterly convinced and most terribly distressed. I even phoned the cleaning lady and asked whether she'd ever taken her anywhere in her car - no, never - could she please tell my mother this? of course that didn't help either.

The trauma went on for about 48 hours. Eventually, thank heaven, her conviction changed - it was not my father after all, but someone had come to the door and asked her to get rid of a dead body, probably a gangster. (!). I said, now why on earth would a gangster come and ask an old lady of nearly 89 with no car any more to get rid of a dead body? Wouldn't he have a better way? She did admit that he must have been a particularly stupid gangster, but he had definitely come. Thank heaven this particular bee in her bonnet buzzed right off shortly afterwards, but it was awful at the time, and I was very glad I was able to stay with her while it lasted.

Looking back, I should probably have told her that I knew all about it, he had been retrieved and buried properly, so not to worry, but it was all so stark and drastic I just didn't think of that at the time.

 

[Pookie]

My dreams just lately are of my life before Peter &family,although grandchildren come during them. All mixed up but the morning confusion.is real to me. I've had monsters and bad peoples eyes . frightening.
Chatting to OH ABOUT this thread he agreed that he had noticed that I am more without it in the morning and get tired earlier at night
He never said anything though until now.

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[Auntiep]

Thanks everyone it helps to know others have similar experience and the insight might help to deal with it. I don't get as alarmed now, but the morning she said there were snakes under the bed I was pretty scared myself!

P x

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