My husband has Alzheimer 's for 6 years and I am a 24/7carer. I was on the verge of caving in so a weeks respite was arranged for him to give me a much needed break. I have to admit I loved it. I became me again, no stress,no worries and time to do whatever I wanted. However he did not cope very well. Was abusive and very vocal with the staff who it seems were brilliant with him. On the last 2days he was there my friend who visited said he was very low , cried and said he wanted to slit his throat as he hated the place. I thought things would be better when he came home but he 's so much worse. Very aggressive,short tempered, incapable of understanding simple instructions and won't sleep. He 's only been home 3 days and I m soo low again. It was to recharge my batteries but if you use batteries 24/7 they soon run out. I am now wanting my last week's life again not this Hell. Has anyone else felt like this after respite and if so how did you get over it.
had weeks respite but things are now worse
- Thread starter Humptydumpty
- Start date
Respite for you, is understandable.
Respite for the PWD is a strange place they don't understand.
Getting back into your routine, will I'm sure help, both of you. It may take some time to establish again.
Maybe time to consider full time care for him.
That will take more time to accept, be guided by the staff as to any visitors for him, it may take quite some time for him to settle, enough not to be too upset by visitors leaving him.
Bod
Respite for the PWD is a strange place they don't understand.
Getting back into your routine, will I'm sure help, both of you. It may take some time to establish again.
Maybe time to consider full time care for him.
That will take more time to accept, be guided by the staff as to any visitors for him, it may take quite some time for him to settle, enough not to be too upset by visitors leaving him.
Bod
Respite is a big step and can be a wake-up call.
It sounds like you need to consider other options now. You need to consider your future as well as your husband's. It may worth considering more respite or starting to look around for suitable full-time care.
It sounds like you need to consider other options now. You need to consider your future as well as your husband's. It may worth considering more respite or starting to look around for suitable full-time care.
Hi a few suggestions but forgive me if you have already thought of them:
Daycare.... it's a lifeline for me and it keeps my mother busy. She comes home with all kinds of arts and crafts projects. I never called it daycare or she would've refused to go. I got the daycare centre to collect her and return her so she couldn't make excuses not to go. I gradually increased the days from 1-3.
Sitting services.... I don't use one because there isn't one where my mum lives but if there was I would just to be able to have an evening/afternoon out now and again.
Community mental health team...... medication to help with /aggression/depression not sleeping. Better to contact these folks than a GP because they usually understand dementia in greater depth. This combined with daycare made a huge difference to my mother's life and mine.
Hope it helps
Daycare.... it's a lifeline for me and it keeps my mother busy. She comes home with all kinds of arts and crafts projects. I never called it daycare or she would've refused to go. I got the daycare centre to collect her and return her so she couldn't make excuses not to go. I gradually increased the days from 1-3.
Sitting services.... I don't use one because there isn't one where my mum lives but if there was I would just to be able to have an evening/afternoon out now and again.
Community mental health team...... medication to help with /aggression/depression not sleeping. Better to contact these folks than a GP because they usually understand dementia in greater depth. This combined with daycare made a huge difference to my mother's life and mine.
Hope it helps
Agree with la Lucia. You absolutely need the breaks so see what can be arranged with the least disruption for your husband e.g day care and sitting services/live in carer all of which I use for my Mum and it is a Godsend.
I do understand though that you may not always want to go out or go away. You may simply want to be in your home to potter about or perhaps have friends round without having to put someone else's needs first or be distracted or interrupted by them. If that is the case I am not sure what can be done but you absolutely deserve a break and I do know that the positive effects of a break quickly evaporate if you have to deal with all the fall out afterward.
I do understand though that you may not always want to go out or go away. You may simply want to be in your home to potter about or perhaps have friends round without having to put someone else's needs first or be distracted or interrupted by them. If that is the case I am not sure what can be done but you absolutely deserve a break and I do know that the positive effects of a break quickly evaporate if you have to deal with all the fall out afterward.
Hi I have to agree that the respite week makes me feel even more resentful rather than rested. It reminds me of what my life would be like without all this stress. At the moment we are stuck between a rock and a hard spot. I am in no state to be caring and MIL is not bad enough for a home and so we live in limbo from day to day. Currently being treated for exhaustion. I am emotionally depleted and physically kaput! So yes I know exactly how you feel. Not to mention the disruption of getting back into a "routine".....sometimes I wonder if we should just forget about the respite to make things less complicated or make me less likely to be more unhappy than I am already.
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Sent from my SM-G930F using Talking Point mobile app
Humpty - this is just as much about you as it is your husband. The two of you are a team, I'm guessing. But you've done more than your fair share of 24/7. Can you find it in you to relinquish the day to day caring to the professionals?
I have every sympathy with you. My MIL had to go through the same with her husband. You have to remember that many of the distressing things they say aren't really them talking, it's the dementia. Easier said than done I know - my mum says all sorts of things that make me and my brother feel really guilty but she would never have said such things before the dementia took hold. It's hard though and I do find myself getting upset/furious! We have just started live-in care for my mum and I know when I visit tomorrow she will complain constantly about it and say that I never see her (I make the 3 hour round trip at least 3 times a week!) etc etc. I must stay calm, I must stay calm! I won't! When my MIL realised that she could no longer cope (and tbh I don't know how she coped for as long as she did) her husband went into a home which he hated at first of course. But he did settle eventually. She visited him almost every day and sometimes he was rude, sometimes indifferent, sometimes begged to go home. It was really hard and there is always the guilt. But there's guilt whatever we do - we have to remember that guilt is a completely wasted emotion. It serves absolutely no purpose apart from to spoil our own lives! Anyway, it was so much better for my MIL when her husband went into a home. Looking after someone with dementia isn't the same as looking after a loved one who has physical difficulties. I don't believe it is something that one person can do (except in the early stages) without affecting their health and the health and well being of other members of their family. I really hope that you manage to get more help and support. Keep posting!
It's like some form of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder revisited when you go back to a PWD, it brings back all of what you put up with and came to used think of as being normal and hits you in the face with what it's like again.
Now my wife is in care I go every day and most days are fine, some very good, some less so good but just sometimes when she goes back to how she used to be I just have to leave. She only seems to want to hit me, call me names and generally abuse me, the staff say she's fine with them except for personal care.
I'd ask the question is he now worse or is that you had a week to readjust to normality and now you're having to recalibrate back to what "normality" was before you stepped back into the real world for a while?
K
Now my wife is in care I go every day and most days are fine, some very good, some less so good but just sometimes when she goes back to how she used to be I just have to leave. She only seems to want to hit me, call me names and generally abuse me, the staff say she's fine with them except for personal care.
I'd ask the question is he now worse or is that you had a week to readjust to normality and now you're having to recalibrate back to what "normality" was before you stepped back into the real world for a while?
K
