Paranoia & Accusations of Stealing

nettiecass

Anyone else deal with this? If so, what works for you? This is the biggest issue with my mom.  she has accused cleaning people and care companions of stealing - not to their faces; she makes the complaints to me, non stop.  I've had to let people go because of her relentless accusations.  She gets so angry.  Hard to deal with.

Rescue mom

My mom did this when she was in a facility, and from what I read here, it seems to be pretty common wherever. About. 99.5 percent of the time, whatever was “stolen” would turn up later in some weird place in her apartment. 

What often works (for a while anyway) is say something like, oh that’s terrible. I’ll check into that.” Or “I’ll look for it” then distract her with something else. Maybe even “I’ll call the police and report it.” Just some kind of semi-agreement and sympathy…she usually forgot pretty quickly. Many times such complaints reflect a want or need for your time/attention (never enough).

Sometimes I’d just go get another one and say “oh look, here’s your..(whatever)” she never admitted to being wrong about stealing, but it at least provided some calm. A few times, though, she admitted to hiding things so they didn’t get “stolen.” Then of course she forgot where.

If the anger is extreme and/or often, she may benefit from some meds with a calming effect. A doctor can prescribe those.

It doesn’t sound like she’s in a facility. But if so, it’s true that other residents may walk away with things that catch their eye. That’s why facilities advise having nothing valuable/irreplaceable there, and also putting her name on things.

loveskitties

My father has the same issue when something goes missing or there are people he does not remember coming into the house.

There is nothing we have found which keeps him from these thoughts.

You can just reassure him that all is well.

harshedbuzz

It might be time to consult with a geripsych for medication.

Dad was like this as well. Meds took the edge off this but didn't extinguish it entirely. Sometimes it was useful and appropriate to validate his feelings and then help him look for whatever was missing if there was a good chance it would be found. Sometimes he'd accuse us of taking his TV remote when it was in his lap- so this would be a case where that would work. 

Once he accused me of short-selling his beach house for the amount of money he lost day-trading. This was a recurring accusation. Once I just apologized for making a bad decision and said I would never do it again and he forgave me and dropped it for a while.

BassetHoundAnn

My mom has been doing this for four years now. It started abruptly, out of the blue she began accusing relatives and her best friend of 30 years of sneaking into her house at night, stealing things and substituting items. There was no reasoning with her. It continued after I moved her to a quasi-assisted living residence. She was marching to the office several times a day to claim her apartment had been ransacked, her purse stolen, things gone missing. I had to take away her medic alert pendant because she was pressing it to summon police. Now she's in a memory care facility and is still claiming that people are stealing things from her. Other residents make the same accusations. The strange thing is my mom doesn't even recognize her own belongings anymore and I think that that's what at the heart of the paranoia and accusations. The world no longer looks familiar to the person suffering from dementia, they can no longer recognize their belongings so certainly someone must be stealing or substituting things. It's a frustrating thing to deal with. I always felt terrible for the friends and relatives accused of stealing especially since they had been so dedicated to my mom for so many years.

linuxhitman

My wife suffers from that particular delusion. for some aspects I have found a workaround. For others not yet. A typical scenario:

 W: Where is my <object>?

M: Where did you leave it?

W: I left it on the piano bench.

M: If you left it there then that is where you should look.

W: I did but <person being accused> took it.

M: No one is stealing your <object>.

W: I saw <person being accused> take it.

Where <object> was the remote control for the TV, I found attaching a beeper to it help me to find it. If you do this, be sure to attach it securely. She would take the beeper off occasionally but, after I put away the other remotes, she seems to accept the the dangling beeper as normal. Now I check every morning and put her remote and her glasses where she can find them. That seems to have been stable for a while now.

The above also worked for her Kindle though I don't think she is reading it any more.  When I take it away for charging she doesn't seem to miss it.

The case of the stolen toothpaste was a bit more difficult to solve. I finally stumbled on buying the "travel" size a dozen or so at at time and adding a little sleight-of-hand.

Each time she wants to brush her teeth, I give her a tube of toothpaste and ask her to bring it back to me when she is done so I can keep it safe for her. Most times she does this without complaint.

When she starts accusing others of taking it, I tell her, "No one is stealing your toothpaste. You left it with me (last night or this morning) to keep for you. Even if she did not bring it back previously, I retrieve another tube from the cache and hand it to her to maintain the illusion. I again ask her to return it to me for safe-keeping which she usually does.

Wash, rinse, and repeat.

CaringMate

This was one of the behaviors that caused me the most stress as I was being the one who was accused of stealing.  My partner was so focused on his things being stolen, that he would hide his belongings and then moments later he would forget that he hid it and then would come raging at me saying that I stole "whatever" it was.  In the early stages of this behavior, I would literally rip our house apart looking for what he claimed I stole.  It was so hurtful to me that I found it necessary to find what was missing to show him I didn't steal it.  That was wrong on my part as it only served to hurt me deeper when he chose to ignore the "found" item and never thought to apologize to me or say he was sorry.  It was maddening.  As time passed, I learned to stay calm when he accused me of stealing and would just tell him that I would look for it and bring it to him when it was found.  I still drove myself crazy trying to find what he had hidden, but I didn't let him see me get upset.  I must say, he was very creative in his hiding places and after time I knew his go to locations so finding things became easier.  After a year or so, this behavior settled down and he just grew into other equally difficult behaviors.  In my experience, there is no reasonable way to keep up with dementia behaviors, you just have to accept and acknowledge that they are part of the disease process and not take the accusations personally.  I know, easier said than done...

Svdesertrat

My mom hides her purse and other things under the bed and then panics when she can't find it, thinks it's stolen, etc. She also moves things all the time and I can't find things from one visit to the next. Very frustrating, but a normal AD behavior

The Son in Law

It is hard to deal with the accusations when you are the ones least likely to do anything to harm these people.  My mother in law accuses my wife of stealing her things all the time.  My wife is supporting her mom through her dementia, despite the accusations and anger.  It breaks my heart to see it.

Cyndisaunt

I am the one accused. She has gone to a new bank and "reported" me with tears . When I discovered that her bills were not auto paid and checks were not deposited I had to sit her down ...after several weeks she finally agreed to allow me to go to the bank with her. Only the ladies at the bank refused claiming social security won't let them. Sadly the SS checks are still not depositing to her account so now I AM the one suspicious of the bank tellers.

Ugh, I never knew how much emotional turmoil being a caregiver would be. I am working with an elder estate attorney to get it all sorted out which is costly but worth the peace of mind for both my LO and myself.

Hugs to all of you!

Margueritejudy

The bank doesn’t handle the direct deposit for Social Security. You go on the SSA.gov web site and you can arrange for direct deposit there. I just did this for my sister. Unfortunately, the SS offices are closed until the Spring, so you can’t just do it there.

The same is true with most other auto pay and auto withdrawal. You have to arrange it with the merchant, not your bank. Of course, you may have to give the merchant either a voided check or the checking account routing and account numbers.

Cyndisaunt

That was more of a "yep, this is happening with my LO too example" than a request for information. 

Thank you. I am aware of how auto-pay works. 

I had her social security checks auto depositing until she changed banks without telling me. Then I logged in with her to her social security account online, we all have an online account here: Social Security (ssa.gov) ... if you do not have one for you or your LO you can quickly register. This allows you to change address and has tons of services. 

I will post separately with a question about the banking experience because I am still bothered by the ordeal. 

thank you all ... I am learning a lot.