Seeing things

Arthur Hopkins

My wife has been seeing things for a few weeks now. Sometimes she knows they aren't real, and other times she insists they are. It's sometimes hard to know which it is sometimes, and I sometimes say the wrong thing. Any suggestions or comments?

M1

Welcome to the forum. Tell her docs. The content of hallucinations is often unpleasant and disturbing, and there are medications that can help.

Rick4407

I went through that behavior for a year or so. I always replied that "I don't see that but your eyes are better than mine". During a Dr visit I always mentioned that my DW had very good vision and was able to see things I did not see. Those comments validated her and also conveyed the symptom to the Dr.

I suspect that for the last 4 or so years of my DW's life I never said "no". I would support and delay, "yes that's a good idea, lets do it later." Rick

Arrowhead

All you can do is to try to live in her world as much as possible. Play along and react in as positive a manner as you can.

Vitruvius

During my DW’s mid stages she often saw things I did not. But in her case I think many of them were what I would call misperceptions rather than full blown hallucinations. She would regularly see a dog where I saw a rock, bush, shadow, etc. It became evident that she often could not full understand what she was looking at. She very often would point to something and ask what it was. In other cases she just filled in the blank with whatever came to mind. In her case none of these were troubling for her and so, as others have said, I just went along with it.

The case was different for her delusions which were often troubling for her. We would take a walk around the neighborhood for example and come back to our house and she would refuse to go in becoming quite agitated that the house was not ours and she thought I was crazy or malicious in trying to coax her in.

ButterflyWings

Before Seroquel/Quetiapine was prescribed (and the reason for it), DH had both delusions and hallucinations. This really ramped up in mid-stages and by early middle of Stage 4 it was a 3-alarm fire for me to get him (us) some help.

He experienced both the misinterpretation of what he saw (and heard) like Vitruvius said, just not being able to distinguish some sights and sounds and having a false belief that it was something else which you then could not convince him otherwise. Like looking at a blanket beside me and thinking it was his son (who doesn't live with us) or dad (long deceased), or hearing traffic sounds outside and imagining something else entirely was happening.

But he also described vivid visions like the red birds flying through our bedroom that he showed me one day (I said they were pretty), and the green trees he pointed to out the window (that wall did not have a window and nothing green, no shadows, nothing remotely that I could see to suggest a tree.) He asked me if those were trees and I said um hmm, that I thought he was right. He also would holler out "Coming!" or "Yes?!" loudly replying to my MIL's voice that he heard calling him from the other room. She died several years prior.

These were not disturbing things for him so I just went with it, but when things ramped up to him believing there were intruders at night who he needed to protect me from (by stashing multiple knives under our mattress and a hammer and pitchfork behind the door 😕) that was a different matter. He started hallucinating more dangerous sounds too, hearing and "seeing" a non-existent burglar trying to break into my car outside at midnight, and he went out (in my suit jacket and his underwear) with a bat to accost them. Well I had his neuropsych on speed dial by that point and we were madly tweaking the Seroquel dosage to get these dangerous developments under control before someone got hurt. Thankfully, it worked.

I also was rapidly disappearing any and every thing in the house that could be weaponized obviously, because the reality is he was sometimes starting not to recognize me or other family members who occasionally stopped by. It was just a matter of time I feared, before something tragic occurred. Worst case could also have been him being perceived as a threat by someone who might call for backup and he would end up hurt or dead.

GothicGremlin

This happened with my sister too, although it was much later - she was probably at the beginning of stage 6.

She had hallucinations and delusions, and at first it was fine, and I just went along with it. Like, she'd see a small flock of birds outside the window in her memory care bedroom, but she didn't see them as birds, she saw them as cats. Hmm, cats don't fly, but I just rolled with it and commented on how cute the flying cats were.

Later though, The Lady showed up, she was a persistent hallucination. Apparently she was mean and wanted to hurt me and our brother, sometimes she'd want to "steal" me (I never figured out what that meant).

She also hallucinated my dad and my uncle (both had passed away). My dad would show up in her room, and my uncle would show up in the dining area. She was iffy on whether or not my dad was alive, but she knew my uncle had passed away, and so knew she shouldn't be seeing him in the dining room.

Seroquel helped a lot.

Arthur Hopkins

Thanks for all your comments. Some of you are having worse trouble than I am. My wife got mad last night because I don't "believe her" when she tells me the things she sees, like people climbing in our trees. She said she was going to divorce me (for the 12th time) and called me names. I tried to explain I just didn't see them. Today she asked me to call a cab or take her to the airport so she can go to her Dad's house. She's done that several times. Her doctor has been no real help in all this. If she returns I plan to take her to a different doctor.

terei

Certainly you should ask the dr about meds, but until then, being noncommittal about her hallucinations is probably going to work better for you. If the hallucinations are not agitating or frightening her, a better response would have been ‘wow, that’s something, isn’t it?’. If she wants to go the the airport, tell her you just heard on the radio that there is a problem at the airport (lightening strike, tornado, whatever). + you’ll check on it tomorrow for her.

ButterflyWings

Hey @Arthur Hopkins there was an article here recently (NY Post, I think) and the author's dad - a PWD, flew across country alone. Several comments here shuddered at the thought. Is your wife flying somewhere by herself? If she is hallucinating at home it is not a good idea for her to be out and about, especially in an airport, unsupervised. Hopefully you have had contact with her dad or wherever she was headed to, and she made it there OK.

What does her dad think about her condition? I agree with you that you need a different doctor. One that knows about dementias or testing to rule them out and get her (and you) help either way. And Terei is right, we become very good actors when dementia shows up and hijacks our LOs' ability to reason. The best answer is the one that gives the most comfort. That's the golden rule of the dementia fight club.

I'm so sorry you are having to deal with this but will tell you like DH's neuro team told me when he was diagnosed: You're in charge now.