Closing Doors
I'm a 24/7 caregiver for my mom, who has stage 6 dementia. She has an extremely annoying habit about doors. When she goes to the bathroom or the back porch, she never shuts the door all the way. The bathroom is the worst for me (I've seen things I can't unsee). But the porch isn't much better as it lets in summer heat. The kicker is, if I get up to shut the door all the way, she gets mad as an old wet hen. We've talked about it, and I've tried to explain that I don't want to see her go to the bathroom, and said that the outdoor heat is what makes the AC run and make the house so cold (which is kinda not true, but...). Groundhog day...we do it all over the next day.
To add to it, when she's out of the bathroom, or comes inside, she closes the door tight. If I get up to open the bathroom door (we typically leave the bathroom door open if it's unoccupied), she gets up and shuts it.
Does anyone else deal with an obsession over doors?
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My wife. She may go in and out of our front door 10 to 20 times in an hour. She closes the door on her way out, but leaves it open on her way in. Her reasoning seems to be that she will be going back out the door so why bother to close it. She doesn't have a problem closing the bathroom door. However, I put in a night light so she can find it at night. But then, she doesn't turn the light on so she only has the light from the night light. So, I put in a motion detection light that is a lot brighter. If your mother doesn't turn on the bathroom light, this might solve the door problem.0
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Mom stage 6c here and yyyyyeeeeessss same obsession with doors although she likes to shut them. Previous obsession with toilet paper, would remove and waste whole rolls which was really fun when there was a shortage. Previous fto that was an obsession of continually packing to "go home" when she was in her actual home. There have been others, I think you get the idea, obsession to obsession. The doors haven't been as bad as some.
She doesn't get mad when we open them unless we ask her to leave them open then she gets either defensive or emotional. We are learning to just quietly undo whatever has been moved out of place or not left as it should. That can definitely be frustrating, it's very trying and some days can make the saintly snap.
We leave all exterior doors locked at all times because she is a major risk of wandering. She constantly shuts our cats on the wrong side of the basement door and leaves our cats with no potty. That is probably the biggest issue we haven't found a good solution for yet. Sometimes leaving the lights on in the bathroom seems to help her remember to keep the door open.
You are not alone, these are not easy days. Sorry I have no good advice for you.
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AHAHHAHA!!! Toilet paper!! I fell out of my chair with that. My mom is obsessed with TP, but that is a whole other story. Once at Chic-fil-a, she offered to pay and pulled out a handful of TP. With a straight face, I said "6 square should cover it".
Don't say "sorry for not having a solution"....it's comforting enough to know I'm not alone.
Lights are not the major issue, although she does like to leave them on at night sometimes. She said something once about not wanting to be locked out, but I try to explain that shutting it doesn't mean it's locked....but that isn't her go-to excuse. Most of the time, the anger is about being told what to do (like when I say "shut the door, mom!!"), or seeing me just shut it for her.
I don't think there is a solution.
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My DH has a friend with Asperger's who has difficulties with doors. House doors, bathroom doors, refrigerator doors. He is unable to close them. I've posted signs on the doors encouraging closure but they've been ignored. The human brain is a mystifying thing, isn't it?
My mom with Alzheimer's also has problems with doors. She keeps fearing she is going to be locked out, so she props them all open with furniture before going through them. When she closes them she piles furniture against them to keep them shut.
I've stopped trying to convince her to do otherwise.
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Toilet paper and doors! There are wads of tp all over the house, clean thank goodness. But the door opening and closing is constant. Some of them squeak and she opens them slowly so it seems like a full minute of squeak. Then close and repeat. I find outside doors wide open at the same time she has closed the dog in the bedroom. When I am bringing groceries in from the car, I leave the outer door and mud room door open so I can freely go back and forth. She will close them behind me and then stand in front of them.0
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What about adding a tension spring to the doors to "help" them close?0
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My mom would always close the bathroom door tight, even when she wasn't in there and like you, we liked to keep it open since it was tiny and had an air duct in it that would help keep the back of the house cool or warm. Then for some reason she would pull her bedroom door almost shut, but would never get it to latch. Well the dogs loved that. I don't know how many times I found things like chap sticks and her trash ate by them. I even put signs up as reminders, but they did no good. I felt like when she was here all I did was open or close doors every time I got up to do something.
There were also times she would just leave the sliding glass door wide open in the middle of summer.
Her other obsession was with locks. We had to be careful because there were times we would find that the door to our garage was locked. We typically went in and out our house via the garage, but we never had a key to the door that led into the house, so if we didn't catch that we would have been completely locked out.
It is the small things that will drive you crazy, although I probably didn't have that far to travel to begin with
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The bathroom door thing ... and here I thought it was just DH's quirk! This just started about 2 months ago. When he is in the bathroom he leaves the door wide open. Hello! Then when he leaves the bathroom he'll shut the door. He will sometimes ask as he is leaving the bathroom "should the door be open or closed?". Since this is a repeated query the instruction is clearly not sticking. The majority of the time it is just the two of us in the house, so it's not a big issue, but I'm concerned that on those occasions when we have guests, someone will get an unexpected show.
When I play the game of "what would I do if I won the lottery?" ... top of the list would be to build a house with a wing for DH, complete with his own safe and accessible bathroom that never has to be seen or used by anyone but him.
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Oh, and toilet paper. Wads and wads in the toilet bowl. And I know that because remembering to flush is also becoming a thing of the past.0
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I have to remember to shut the water off to the toilet because mom uses about a half roll of paper if I leave it on she will stop it up and flush until water runs over.0
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glitterqueenHow long did it take your mother to get threw the I want to go home stage my mom has lived in the same house we live in now for the past 60 years and no longer thinks it's home nor does she recognize me as her son.1
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My DH is obsessed yet with TP, thank goodness, but has been forgetting to flush frequently. I'm so sorry but I had such a laugh at your mom trying to pay with toilet paper. I guess if we don't laugh we will cry.
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Commonly Used Abbreviations
DH = Dear Husband
DW= Dear Wife, Darling Wife
LO = Loved One
ES = Early Stage
EO = Early Onset
FTD = Frontotemporal Dementia
VD = Vascular Dementia
MC = Memory Care
AL = Assisted Living
POA = Power of Attorney
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