I am the carer for my husband who was diagnosed with Alzheimer's at the age of 55. We returned to England after living in Australia for 12 years as our boys live here and Nigel wanted to be close to them. I am struggling with the lack of support and services that are available in this country. I have to work full time as we are not entitled to any benefits for two years as we left the country to live despite paying into the system for 25 years. Nigel sits on his own all day in front of the Tele and sleeping. He is retreating more and more into himself and he desperately needs social activities to stimulate him during the day. I cannot believe there is nothing out there for him. Does anyone have any suggestions or advice? I feel so down by my lack of ability to find anything and feel like I am letting Nigel down. We live in Leicestershire.
I have just found this thread. I too live in Leicestershire, but cant offer much practical advice, as my husband is now in a care home. When he was at home, however, I did try for the befriending service offered by the AS but I was told there was a waiting list, and that they couldnt even put me on it as, at that time, my OH didnt have an official diagnosis, although he had had a memory test and only scored 8, and had his driving licence taken away, but he hadnt had a brain scan to find out what sort of dementia he had.
Do you have a community psychiatric nurse (CPN) allocated to your OH? If not you should see your GP,with your husbands diagnosis, and get referred. They made regular visits to me, as did ladies from the AS, to inform me of benefits and help I could get
Also I found AGE UK very helpful - you can find out a lot from their factsheets - and I was also visited by a lovely man who worked for AGE UK in liason with the CPN, and he and the CPN finally managed to get my husband to have a brain scan.
I find it shocking that you cannot get any benefits for 2 years when you have payed into the system for so long, when you think of all the things that go on in this country as mentioned by fizzie in her post.
I will send you a pm, telling you where I am in Leicestershire, and if you are near my area I may be able to help more, but you wont be able to reply to me until you have posted 10 times