Sorting

RobertsBrown

My gal likes to sort stuff.  This is mostly making piles according to some mysterious logic.  This has a soundtrack that goes with it: "this goes here, and that goes there, and this goes here, and....." and then a resorting.  it can be magazines, or picture books, and unfortunately anything i leave in plain sight.  Bills, mail, receipts, etc.

It's a pretty benign behavior so far, but tell me if this sound familiar:

Your exhausted self closes your eyes for a second, and then you find your self snapping awake with the realization that she has been busy.  Anything can be anywhere!

And the hunt begins.

I am lucky her hobbies do not involve power tools or fire.

Rick4407

Hello Roberts, That's very familiar ground for us.  While she will sort anything, paper towels, kleenex, and toilet paper are the hands down favorites.  They are folded, refolded, stacked, and moved from one place to the other.  

She also does "hide and seek", where she will put things "away" and they are then gone for days.  We now have duplicates of many strange things, the lint screen for the dryer was gone for about a week before I finally purchased a second.  I have reached the point where when something disappears I wait about 24 hours then order a new one on line.   

The most annoying inexplicable behavior for me is removing one pillow case or pillow from the bed.  (we use 4 pillows on our bed)  If she is alone in the bedroom for any period of time one pillow case is then "put away", sometimes its the whole pillow.  Yes we now have extras, Amazon loves her habits!   Things could be worse!  Rick

LadyTexan

Oh yes. This sounds familiar. My dear Mom who has dementia does this. She and my Dad have accumulated a lot of things in there 80 plus years. She sorts the items, she moves the items and then she forgets where she put them. It is usually benign, except when she clutters the walking paths through the house. 

My Dad also had a scare when my Mom sorted her pricier and/or sentimental jewelry. She was able to get some items that were kept in a safe place. She rehomed some of the jewelry to my sister and then me without telling my Dad. To top if off, she did not remember giving the jewelry to my sister and me.

One day, over coffee, he was telling me about the lost jewelry. I was able to solve the "mystery" for him. It was an important wake-up call that she was giving things away. This can be a whole other issue.

Hang in there and be on the lookout.

Arrowhead

My wife doesn't organize things, she just moves them. Most of her day is spent wandering the house and moving things. Some things I have hidden or put out of her reach because some of the things that she's moved have never been found. Luckily none of them have been important. Still, I make sure that there are plenty of things that she can move around so most of the time she stays busy. The upside is that it gives me time to do the things that I want and need to do.

Rescue mom

My DH with Alzheimer’s really, really loved sorting coins. That was good, since we had so many jars and containers filled with loose change. 

The folding —almost exclusively dirty used paper including Kleenex, table napkins, paper towels—was also a big thing. Big ick, and health issues. He never would fold cloth items. (??) I learned early to intercept and hide/lock away important papers.

Hidings not great because he still rummages through drawers, often rearranging some items on the closest flat surface. Thankfully, he hasn’t thrown stuff away that I know of. But things I thought were hidden often resurfaced.

He also goes through trash cans (inside and outside, ours and neighbors) and retrieves contents, including old food. He hasn’t brought home big items recently, though, and not got in neighbors’ trash so much. I watch better now.

He comes *so close* to doing something useful.

dancsfo

I see folding behavior too, such as taking a stack of new paper napkins, folding each of them and putting into a separate pile. I am trying to use that as a harmless distracting (redirection?) task that is semi-useful, and hope it prevents PWD from doing harmful things elsewhere, such as wanting to "help" while someone else is cooking.

I am tempted to unfold the paper napkins and put them back in the pile so PWD can spend time folding them again. I hope the "trick" doesn't get noticed.

I am still searching for other semi-useful / harmless things for PWD to do. There's stuff like puzzles and drawing kits, but I suspect that the folding makes PWD think there's something useful is being done, and I also think it relieves boredom.

harshedbuzz

@dancsfo

This is an older thread, but I had to respond.

My aunt was an Olympic-level napkin folder. We found them everywhere cleaning out her house. I bought her Passat and found the glove box, console and pockets filled with neatly folded napkins from all manner of restaurants, lobster shacks, burger joints and roadside ice cream stands. I cleaned them all out. Or so I thought. About a year after buying the car, I called AAA to change a flat and found my spare tire gently padded by hundreds more.

HB

Dunno

,.. it is an old thread, but hey, I’ll join in. When I buy fruit, it usually ends up wrapped in paper towel, tucked in a coffee cup hidden in the cupboard….. I’d love to find the titles to my pickup and her car.

Arrowhead

My wife went through a long period where she wandered the house, picking things up and putting them in other places. She also hid things. I think she did it because it was the only thing she was capable of doing. My advice is to lock up or put out of her reach anything you want to not go missing. Then let her do whatever she is capable of doing. You may be interested in the book The Complete Guide to Alzheimer's Proofing Your Home by Mark L. Warner. You can find it on Amazon for $31.99.

trottingalong

My DH has begun moving items when I’m outside or in another room. He focuses a lot on our living room and small decorative items. I’ve also noticed things disappearing. That’s when I look in the garbage cans. We had a nice 8x10 drawing from an artist friend I had framed and it sat on a small table in our guest room. I don’t go in there often. One day I went in there and there was the empty frame sitting on the table. He had removed the drawing, but left the frame. I also found a small metal sculpture our son in law had made for us in the garbage can. My DH always liked that. I took it out and hid it.

ImMaggieMae

Is folding napkins or paper towels a universal thing? It seems like everyone with LOs with dementia that I ask, has noticed this. It seems much more common than some of the other behaviors. I wonder why?

JeriLynn66

My FIL cut paper into strips to fold and use as bookmarks. Even though I bought proper bookmarks.

Jo C.

Unfortunately, I learned the hard way about protecting items when such dynamics surfaced. Get photographs and important papers out of sight and away from access. We lost all photos and many important papers including birth and marriage certificates and mortgage papers, etc. It had not occurred to me that this would happen and it was done when I was outside or in another room or even when sleeping at night. Some folks here have purchased file cabinets with locking drawers and have secured such items locking them up.

Lots of stuff to fold, small laundry stuff to fold; a good sized basket filled with ribbons and buttons and other gee-gaws in different colors and textures for her to fool through may perhaps help her use her hands and quiet thoughts.

Good luck and hopes for things to settle down,

J.