Agitation and Demands

Gosh! I wish I had a good solution. I went through that phase, too. It was extremely hard to bear. The anger outbursts and unreasonable demands are not to be ignored cuz DH just got even closer in my face until there's not a space in between us. I won't go into other manic episodes, but I silently vowed then that it was time for memory care and started looking for one. I could hardly wait for an opening, and when the call finally came that a room was available, it was my salvation.

It will take time for the medication to work. It's difficult to deal with the behaviors. Keep in contact with the doctor and adjust as needed. It's usually best to slowly increase the medicine and give it a chance to fully work. It's also hit or miss and another medicine may work better. I wish you the best of luck. Keep us posted.

Yes, but he became more violent. I didn't feel safe, couldn't sleep at night. There were voices in his head that told him to hurt me.

I would discuss a referral to a geriatric psychiatrist with your PCP. Most MC facilities won’t accept someone with that behavior. You’d hate to face a placement crisis that could have been avoided.

I know how hard this is on you. It’s exhausting … always shoving our feelings down deep while trying to remain calm for them. I also deal with the anger and yelling and cussing from my DH. It is so unfair when we are the ones doing EVERYTHING. I can handle the “no appreciation ever” but I don’t always do so well with the “yelling and hate-filled looks.” We are in the same position - not able to afford MC. If things get too bad, I will have to put him on Medicaid and in a nursing home. I hope it never comes to that, but I also know, from reading all the posts, that sometimes that is the best solution. One day at a time.

I now do bits of things that I enjoy. I’ve got so many things that I would love to do and things that we did together and all I seem to do is give them up one at a time. No more tuckshop duties with the grandkids, no more kayaking, no more sailing, no more talking to friends on the phone for more than 10mins, no more poetry writing, very little sewing. We have found ‘Sailability’ which is marvellous but I can see it’s not going to last, so sad. What a difficult journey for us all and our partners. Constantly finding different solutions, changing the pattern, changing our style and finding solace in fabricating the truth. And wondering all the time when does this journey end and do I want the end to come. It’s so sad.

I agree with the statement that it is not the person it is the dieses, but this diesis is not like a kidney diesis where you can make a big move and donate a kidney to give the patient a chance to get better or anything like that. Sacrificing your health and life when there is no hope of the patient getting better or ever enjoying life again is much harder and I don't know where the limit should be. My wife is in MC and our marriage was not really good she had cheated on me a couple of times, but I go see her every day and it still hurts when she asks when she can come home. MC has made a lot of things easier, but not easy.

That's excellent news, DWTired! Wishing you continued success.

We call those "fiblets." We all do it, because it is cruel not to. The alternative is to tell her she is dumb as a rock, getting dumber, and you can't take her anywhere. I wouldn't do that to a stranger, much less to my wife. As you said, we do what we have to do.

We went through Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde within minutes. It drove me to the brink of wanting to end it all. I only found salvation after placing DH in memory care, although new problems surfaced. At least, I didn't have to fear for my own safety. The only thing that helped was finding the right combination of medications.