Incontenence

BBR

My 96 year old father refuses to wear pull-ups but he can't make it to the bathroom fast enough with his walker. He wets himself all day. And he makes a mess when using the bathroom for #2. Also, he refuses to bathe or let anyone wash him. He's very defiant. We were thinking of giving him an anxiety medication to help him relax and be cooperative enough to allow someone to give him a shower, but we are concerned that he will be loopy/drowsy and fall when walking. Has anyone experienced anything like this? What medications have you tried or any other advice???

BabstheBus

I definitely wouldn't give random anxiety meds. You must mean you are going to ask his doctor about anxiety meds right? There are so many interactions and I know dementia patients absolutely shouldn't be given any benzos. Call his doctor and good luck.

BBR

Thank you for replying.

Yes, we are trying to find a psychiatrist who has experience with dementia so they prescribe something for him (if something exists). Thanks for the heads up about the benzos. I will make a note of that.

Emily 123

It can be a huge struggle. I’m sorry.

If you’re still giving him the option to use his own underwear then remove those from his room and replace them with incontinence briefs. There are tab-sided ones that might work better with fecal incontinence than him trying to step in and out of briefs. He doesn’t have the ability to remember or understand why he needs to switch, so there’s no reason to let him make the decision. He’s not having to do the clean up.

Meds may help him accept assistance.

Shaving cream works well to remove poop on all kinds of surfaces.

BBR

https://alzconnected.org/discussion/comment/197062#Comment_197062

Thank you! That is very helpful. We will give it a try. I can imagine him just walking around naked rather than wearing the pull-ups or putting pants on with nothing underneath, but we can at least try!

Smilescountry

Switching to pull ups can be very demeaning, and they can have problems of their own, so some of the suggestions that you have already received are very wise. In my opinion, so much depends upon the personality of the person needing the pull ups. However, I can tell you what worked for us. My dad is a take charge sort of guy, but he also doesn't want to be a bother to anyone. We explained to him that the disposable pants were for the convenience of the aides who were helping him, and he accepted that reasoning. We haven't been able to just "take away" things from him. He is far into Alzheimer's, but he is convinced that he can still reason through things (not) and gets upset when we change too much without his input. I spend a lot of time thinking of ways to get him to do what needs to be done and, for him, not being a burden to others and wanting to listen to the doctors goes a long way. I think that the secret is to do ones best to get inside the mind of your LO and try to see things from his point of view. That helps when trying to figure out how to help guide him to accept what must be. Regarding being defiant, I have been told that that is often one of the stages that the lO has to go through. My dad was on a low dose of a medicine for depression because he lost a daughter and was having trouble dealing with it. He was also put on memantine for his memory. It doesn't really do much for his memory, but the two medications working together seem to keep him at a more even temperament. For awhile we gave him just the medication for depression, which did not help at all. Using low doses for the memantine and the medicine for depression together seem to take the edge off without putting Dad at a higher risk of drowsiness and falls. Dad's neurologist and primary care physician are strong believers that other things should be tried before medicating. When Dad goes through times of staying awake at night, the facility now goes through his daily schedule and sees if he is staying awake enough during the day to allow him to sleep at night. It isn't easy, but, so far, we are managing.