Sometimes I think I am going crazy

toolbeltexpert

Sometimes I think I am going crazy my dw will seem to be lucid. It makes me question what's going on with her, I have studied so much over the past 4 years.is it depression or dementia,  she knows her brain is dying  and her short term is a minute. We did yesterday's  daily devotion again today I didn't bother to mention it. She  has moments where she is worried someone Is gonna break in at night and  she closes her blinds so they can't look in, her room is on the second floor. She has really stopped doing her favorite  craft, she starts counting and folding towels but almost never gets past that. She will not go to get tested.  Gonna cut it short gotta go pickup food.

Ed1937

It makes it really hard when they won't get tested. Would it help if you told her that there are many conditions that mimic dementia, but can be treated, and reverse the symptoms? That would not even be a small fib. There actually are many conditions that can be treated, but she must go through testing to find out if one of those are her problem. Best of luck to you.

toolbeltexpert

Ed1937 wrote:

It makes it really hard when they won't get tested.

Thanks Ed funny you should say that. While we were driving today I tried just that. I told her her thyroid or B12 def could cause that, in the end she just said I am fine. I am getting better with fibs not that I like it.I hope things are going well with you as you seem to believe the same way i do about telling someone they have Altz.

  

abc123

Dear Toolbelt, I’m sorry you have to be here! 

Discussing anything at all, that’s urgent/important is useless and pointless now. Please try to remember she has a damaged brain. There could be brief moments in time when her brain may misfire and she will be lucid for just a flash of a moment. 

You have to learn how to out think her now. Make up a reason to get her to a doctor. Any reason she will buy into. You could say the appointment is for you. Make it all about you. Do not mention her in any way relating to this appointment. It really helps to communicate with the doctor prior to the actual appointment. You can send a letter or email first. You can use the patient portal. Explain to the doctor that this appointment HAS GOT TO BE under the false pretense that it’s your appointment. Explain as many of her behaviors as possible in this letter. If she has behavioral problems, perhaps you could take a short video to send ahead also. It’s very important to be properly diagnosed. If I’ve said things you are already aware of, please forgive me. I wish you the best!

Stuck in the middle

Things like B12 and thyroid are tested via blood tests as part of an annual physical.  Why not make an appointment for an "annual" physical?  On the day of the exam, you tell her "Well, today's the day for our checkup" and drive her there.  

My wife requires regular blood tests due to general medical conditions.  I tell her on the day of the exam, remind her to wear short sleeves so she can "get stabbed" as she calls it, and off we go.  No argument, no drama.

I'm not above bending the truth when necessary, but this approach doesn't even require that.

Stuck in the middle

As far as going crazy, my wife is sharper some days than others.  I accept that and deal with whatever presents itself on any given day.  It's like the weather.  Yesterday, the high temperature was 55 degrees, today it was 30.  Cest la vie.

toolbeltexpert

abc123 wrote:

Dear Toolbelt, I’m sorry you have to be here! 

Thanks I think if she won't to get tested right now, i am not  gonna fight her. I keep trying the other reasons that she should get tested thyroid, ect things that actually  have hope of recovery.  I guess I am making my own bed, I just start questioning everything. There are times when my stress is thru the roof mostly when she wakes me up and says she's gonna leave. Today  she saw a Christmas card and said she needed to get busy sending out cards for Christmas?  She has forgotten about that now.I do have a dpoa and a backup person although they are a 1000 miles away. I am gonna try to enlist some of her friends from church as an immediate back up. I have been dealing with this for a while but I need to get the other plans set. Everybody else here is going thru this and I read how many get thru it and I get great ideas. I will keep trusting in God as He is always present and my help. One thing I am thankful for I can still get her to go to church although she thinks she hasn't been in a long time. We missed 2 weeks once for me being sick and once for snow. It has been in this time that I really have been questioning  everything. Sorry I ramble I don't get to be with folks and talk being here has helped me just say stuff. I have added a lot of people to my prayer list since I got involved here so many are going thru so much more than me. Gotta go now. Thanks everyone

Tfreedz

Tool belt, go ahead and keep on rambling that’s what we’re here for! Also helps you feel less crazy. 

My mom would be so lucid and convincing at times that I too thought I was going crazy. Even with the doctors and neurologist telling me she had dementia and me seeing it, I questioned. Maybe it was my own wish that it wasn’t true. She came to live with me for the last five months and still cracked jokes like my mother, looked like my mother and talked like my mother. But...she couldn’t remember how to cook or even chop vegetables, we would take a 3 mile walk and an hour later she would ask when we were going to go for our daily walk, I would give her the morning meds and she would tell me she already took them, I would take a shower and when I returned she would ask me where I had been all day. I could go on an on with examples of her cognitive decline. Sometimes when you are close to someone, you just don’t or can’t see all of the things an outsider would see. Or you see it and excuse it as anything else, I know I did.

Keep praying for strength and guidance and things will get clearer for you. In the meantime, we are all here for your ramblings.

Iris L.

toolbeltexpert wrote:

 I told her her thyroid or B12 def could cause that, in the end she just said I am fine. 

This is anosognosia.  She truly believes she is fine!  Anosognosia is a characteristic of the dementias.  If you confront her with reality, she will resist and become upset.  So don't do this.  Learn the work-arounds from the members.  Also, PWDs lose initiative, even if they do want to do something.   She is never going to pick up a telephone and call a doctor and say, "I'm having memory loss, check me out."

Iris