Hi - can anyone give any general advice on the following? I think I need to give some preamble first so you can get the background to our situation.
I live as carer and general houseperson with my 74 yr mother and stepfather.
My mother has been diagnosed with Parkinson's for about 3 years, and this has impeded her quality of life quite a lot.
My stepfather has been diagnosed with Alzheimers for about 2.5 years, and is still in denial about it, and looks like continuing to be so.
He is still very lucid, but has been deemed far enough along to be prescribed Aricept. His main symptoms are being very forgetful, he confabulates (in the strict psychiatric sense), and has paranoid tendencies. He has been stopped from driving.
He has an anxious personality, and is prone to getting very angry if crossed or disagreed with - so mum and me try to avoid conflict, but this is not always possible. He cannot conduct a logical reasoned argument when stressed, and goes to his office to write it down. He is not a man who can be reasoned with, and always thinks he is right, and will strive to be right in an argument.
He has decided that I am the root cause of his difficulties, and regularly writes pages of invective about me, usually full of the same confabulations. These are left lying around, either because he forgets about them or possibly so that me and/or mum will see them.
Mum is thoroughly fed up of this and his other irrational behaviours, and I think pretty fed up with herself and her own state of health, and so all in all, marital relations are often strained. He was widowed, and perceives his first marriage as idyllic, and so perceives his current marital state as pretty poor.
To come eventually to the point - he has been saying on and off for some time now that he wants a divorce. Mum generally responds by saying don't talk daft, I'm not going anywhere, this is just a stressful time, we have three strong-minded people living here, there is bound to be conflict from time to time, etc etc.
We do know that he has been complaining to his health professionals in this vein, and his CPN has advised him to think very carefully before pursuing the divorce route. He could not satisfactorily look after himself if left alone, and would be quite a worry to Social Services. I would not be happy leaving him, and would not want to commute to look after him at one property and mum at another. He would be very lonely I think. He has a fear of being "put in a home", but by himself he would be in a home much sooner than if he remains here with me and mum for company and to look after him.
Mum and I wonder how he would be received if he took himself off (by taxi I presume - we live 7 miles from the nearest town) to a solicitor with a view to setting divorce proceedings in motion. At first presentation he can appear reasonable, but a solicitor would soon begin to suspect his state of mind after talking or meeting with him for a while.
He has no grounds for divorce beyond incompatability. I suspect he would repeat (again) the usual untrue confabulated allegations about me, but then he wouldn't be divorcing me.
What courses of action are open to a solicitor with an Alzheimers client? They surely just can't send him packing, and he deserves a hearing. On the other hand, he is unable to make a rational decision on such an important issue, and the stuff he says would not be true.
Difficult though life can sometimes be, mum and me think that the best thing we can do for everyone for the time being is to all stay put and get on as best we can.
Has anyone experience in this difficult area?
D
I live as carer and general houseperson with my 74 yr mother and stepfather.
My mother has been diagnosed with Parkinson's for about 3 years, and this has impeded her quality of life quite a lot.
My stepfather has been diagnosed with Alzheimers for about 2.5 years, and is still in denial about it, and looks like continuing to be so.
He is still very lucid, but has been deemed far enough along to be prescribed Aricept. His main symptoms are being very forgetful, he confabulates (in the strict psychiatric sense), and has paranoid tendencies. He has been stopped from driving.
He has an anxious personality, and is prone to getting very angry if crossed or disagreed with - so mum and me try to avoid conflict, but this is not always possible. He cannot conduct a logical reasoned argument when stressed, and goes to his office to write it down. He is not a man who can be reasoned with, and always thinks he is right, and will strive to be right in an argument.
He has decided that I am the root cause of his difficulties, and regularly writes pages of invective about me, usually full of the same confabulations. These are left lying around, either because he forgets about them or possibly so that me and/or mum will see them.
Mum is thoroughly fed up of this and his other irrational behaviours, and I think pretty fed up with herself and her own state of health, and so all in all, marital relations are often strained. He was widowed, and perceives his first marriage as idyllic, and so perceives his current marital state as pretty poor.
To come eventually to the point - he has been saying on and off for some time now that he wants a divorce. Mum generally responds by saying don't talk daft, I'm not going anywhere, this is just a stressful time, we have three strong-minded people living here, there is bound to be conflict from time to time, etc etc.
We do know that he has been complaining to his health professionals in this vein, and his CPN has advised him to think very carefully before pursuing the divorce route. He could not satisfactorily look after himself if left alone, and would be quite a worry to Social Services. I would not be happy leaving him, and would not want to commute to look after him at one property and mum at another. He would be very lonely I think. He has a fear of being "put in a home", but by himself he would be in a home much sooner than if he remains here with me and mum for company and to look after him.
Mum and I wonder how he would be received if he took himself off (by taxi I presume - we live 7 miles from the nearest town) to a solicitor with a view to setting divorce proceedings in motion. At first presentation he can appear reasonable, but a solicitor would soon begin to suspect his state of mind after talking or meeting with him for a while.
He has no grounds for divorce beyond incompatability. I suspect he would repeat (again) the usual untrue confabulated allegations about me, but then he wouldn't be divorcing me.
What courses of action are open to a solicitor with an Alzheimers client? They surely just can't send him packing, and he deserves a hearing. On the other hand, he is unable to make a rational decision on such an important issue, and the stuff he says would not be true.
Difficult though life can sometimes be, mum and me think that the best thing we can do for everyone for the time being is to all stay put and get on as best we can.
Has anyone experience in this difficult area?
D