MIL and food obsession

Cape Chris

My MIL has a food obsession. My wife, son, and I live with her.  My son stays with her every day as my wife and I work and MIL cannot be left alone.

We have put up baby gates and locks on the cabinets and fridge because MIL has parkinsons and has issues with falling.

The locks were put on the fridge because we would find food all over the house and MIL would tell us she was making it for the children (there are no children in our house) or that some stranger had come in the house and taken out the food.

More recently MIL has torn the locks off the fridge (no easy feat) and continued to waste food.

Its gotten to the point were if I am making dinner, she will hover around me until I'm done and then get manic when I tell her to wait until the family is together before she can eat.

She has physically attacked both my wife and son because they took the food out of her hands, which she eats with her hands (soup included) out of the serving bowl.

My wife's siblings and other relatives rarely come by and when they do take their mother for a weekend, tell us everything was fine and MIL had no problems.

I'm losing it and this is destroying our family.

What do I do?

Any suggestions on how to control MIL and her food obsession/anger?

Thank you

M1

Welcome Chris.  i would talk to her neurologist about maybe some medication that might help.  I'm sure she's got a lot to take already for the Parkinson's, but delusions (the children) can be part of late Parkinson's, and an antipsychotic or anti-anxiety drug might help.  So sorry you're going through this.

I'm sure others will chime in.  Lots of experienced folks here who are happy to help.  Glad you posted.

towhee

Hello Chris- So your MIL is progressing, I'm sorry, this is hard I know. It might help you to have a little more information about some aspects of dementia. First, along with the hallucinations your MIL is losing any sense of time. Like a one year old she no longer understands the concept of "later" and anxiety makes it worse. About here we stop trying for good nutrition and just aim for calories and less stress. It might help to change the dinner dynamic. Give her a small snack at the table while your wife starts dinner. Removing her from your wife's vicinity might help. Second, it sounds like she is no longer capable of using silverware. My LO went straight from being able to use silverware to being hand fed, but many PWD process through a finger food stage. So, try cleaning her hands and giving her food she can eat with her fingers. Third, that she is fine with other relatives- well, maybe. Sometimes in a different environment or with different people a PWD can manifest social skills that they do not usually. They are not doing this on purpose, it is just how dementia works. So she could be fine. Or, the relatives' idea of fine is different from yours, or they are just being polite for some reason. There is a short article available online called "understanding the dementia experience" that you might find helpful. It seems like your MIL needs constant supervision in the environment she is in now, and that is hard. You might want to start looking at a Plan B, explore in home help, day care or a facility.

Best Wishes