Dementia

[Bluesince1979]

My Mum died yesterday from dementia.

It wasn't a dignified death.

Wouldn't recommend it.

Sorry to hear this. Dementia is an awful disease.

 

[Bluesince1979]

I know the standard greeting here is to say my condolences but as someone who has lived through this recently, I hope you dont mind when I say my congratulations.

There's no dignity or autonomy in being a husk of a person and my Mum dying has made me the happiest in ages. Shes out of pain, shes ok now after years of this. My emotions bounce around between anger and elation because grief is stupid but having seen her in recent times and remembering her as I do, I know she'd have hated this.

The best thing has happened, as morbid as that is. I hope you're handling it well mate.

Im with you. My nanna is 95 and riddled with it. She is tiny but strong and as she has violent outbursts she cant be in a ‘normal’ care home and has to be in one with other violent people with various illnesses of varying ages. Its like one flew over a cuckoos nest. Thankfully shes no idea and thinks half the ‘guests’ work there or are her work colleagues.

She was a strong woman who at 38 and was left with her 2 sons after her husband left her went back to uni, whilst also working 2/3 jobs to fund it, and qualified as a teacher.
I recently posted her pic on the local fb page where she taught , not sure what the response would be, and was so happy that hundreds replied with words like “amazing teacher” and “my favourite teacher” etc. was so lovely to see how she affected so many lives.

She showed signs of dementia just before covid hit, started packing her bags in her bungalow and saying shes going home. When asked where home was she either wasnt sure or would say woodhouse park, where she lived 70 years ago with her mum and dad.
If then, when she was still ok bar these confused moments, id have shown her a glimpse of the future, only 5 years down the line, she would have been horrified!!!

She no longer knows who i am. We were really close, not in a loving sort of way, she wasnt like that, i guess being left with 2 boys hardened her, but we were close in a ‘have a laugh together’ sort of way. When i was little she never hugged me, i had another nanna for that, but she would play footy with me, take me pitch n putt, the pictures. So that was pretty good

I saw her last week, its awful to see this once strong , feisty , hardworking woman to be a tiny mumbling wreck.
When ‘the phone call’ eventually comes it will be utter relief. No one should live like that.

 

[mancityvstoke]

Im with you. My nanna is 95 and riddled with it. She is tiny but strong and as she has violent outbursts she cant be in a ‘normal’ care home and has to be in one with other violent people with various illnesses of varying ages. Its like one flew over a cuckoos nest. Thankfully shes no idea and thinks half the ‘guests’ work there or are her work colleagues.

She was a strong woman who at 38 and was left with her 2 sons after her husband left her went back to uni, whilst also working 2/3 jobs to fund it, and qualified as a teacher.
I recently posted her pic on the local fb page where she taught , not sure what the response would be, and was so happy that hundreds replied with words like “amazing teacher” and “my favourite teacher” etc. was so lovely to see how she affected so many lives.

She showed signs of dementia just before covid hit, started packing her bags in her bungalow and saying shes going home. When asked where home was she either wasnt sure or would say woodhouse park, where she lived 70 years ago with her mum and dad.
If then, when she was still ok bar these confused moments, id have shown her a glimpse of the future, only 5 years down the line, she would have been horrified!!!

She no longer knows who i am. We were really close, not in a loving sort of way, she wasnt like that, i guess being left with 2 boys hardened her, but we were close in a ‘have a laugh together’ sort of way. When i was little she never hugged me, i had another nanna for that, but she would play footy with me, take me pitch n putt, the pictures. So that was pretty good

I saw her last week, its awful to see this once strong , feisty , hardworking woman to be a tiny mumbling wreck.
When ‘the phone call’ eventually comes it will be utter relief. No one should live like that.

My Aunt used to say things like that and got agitated etc.

She'd say "the owners are coming back and we've broken in this house , I'm going back to Manchester where I live"


She left Manchester 20 years earlier to get away from a rough estate.


Horrible horrible disease and experience for her.............. and me.
It was a relief when she went and then I felt guilty.

 

[Bluesince1979]

My Aunt used to say things like that and got agitated etc.

She'd say "the owners are coming back and we've broken in this house , I'm going back to Manchester where I live"


She left Manchester 20 years earlier to get away from a rough estate.


Horrible horrible disease and experience for her.............. and me.
It was a relief when she went and then I felt guilty.

I dont feel guilty about saying her passing will be a relief , she would be horrified to ‘know’ how she has ended up.

 

[mancityvstoke]

I dont feel guilty about saying her passing will be a relief , she would be horrified to ‘know’ how she has ended up.

Think I felt guilty that I gave up on her and found a care home near the end (she only lasted another 8 weeks)

I couldn't cope with 24/7 caring anymore . It made me ill. She was more of a Mum to me than my real Mum.

 

[Bluesince1979]

Think I felt guilty that I gave up on her and found a care home near the end (she only lasted another 8 weeks)

I couldn't cope with 24/7 caring anymore . It made me ill. She was more of a Mum to me than my real Mum.

Again, dont feel guilty. You did more than enough. Caring for someone in that way is a profession, sometimes better letting the professionals take over whilst you just be … you

 

[youngbob]

I watched my granddad go through exactly this sort of thing. He was diagnosed with vascular dementia in 2015 after showing mild symptoms for a few months. He was able to live on his own until 2018. He was able to live in his home with my family for another year after we moved into his house to look after him. We had to move him into a home in 2019. He died in his sleep in 2021, ironically not from dementia but from cancer.

While I lived with him, like you, I was baffled by how he was completely unable to make a cup of tea, or even remember how to put food in his mouth, but could precisely recall his train routes from the 1950s. He was a fireman on steam engines and spent his life going up and down the country. He emigrated to Australia with my grandma and my dad in 1964 and came back in 1968. Ten Pound Poms. He remembered most of that.

I only made sense of it all when it clicked in my head that humans are only able to tell the passage of time through memory. Memories allow us to organise time in our heads. They enable us to have a frame of reference for a particular moment, or era - where we lived, who we lived with, who we were friends with, what music we listened to, what was on TV at the time, etc. Memories mean we can keep all our recollections in order.

So when your memory goes, so too does your frame of reference for time. I think when dementia is particularly advanced and the part of your brain that's responsible for memory begins to shut down, time collapses. Last week feels the same as 1943, a Saturday in 1956 might as well be tomorrow, the day you learned to make a cup of tea is as clear as a drunken night out in 1986. Next year is last week. You forget your own age. And so on and so on.

For that reason, things from those eras start to fold in on each other. Your wife, who was 46 in 1990, suddenly becomes your daughter-in-law, who's 46 in 2023. Your grandson, born in 1987, suddenly looks a lot like a friend you had at school in the 1960s. Your ability to organise memory and time in your mind is faltering and nothing can be separated. You end up viewing time a bit like the Tralfamadorians from Slaughterhouse Five, but against your will.

And the worst part is that, I think, like your dad, my granddad knew it was happening to him as well. The cruel thing about vascular dementia is that it doesn't even send you doolally until the bitter end. My granddad spent 5 years fully aware that he was behaving like a toddler but he was unable to stop himself. He used to pick up a piece of toast and then forget what the purpose of toast was. The way it ripped his dignity away made me angry.

I don't really know where this is going, to be honest. Just glad the thread is open to chat.

Can only quote myself from last year. Just a fucking horrible disease and I pity any family going through it.

 

[kaz7]

If i was given an early diagnosis and i still had lucid times i would honestly take my own life if i could , i just wouldnt want to live on , i only have one brother who is ten yrs older than me and he might not be around to help nor would i want him too, we are not close so it would be a home for me and i wouldnt want that for myself

 

[mancityvstoke]

If i was given an early diagnosis and i still had lucid times i would honestly take my own life if i could , i just wouldnt want to live on , i only have one brother who is ten yrs older than me and he might not be around to help nor would i want him too, we are not close so it would be a home for me and i wouldnt want that for myself

Loads on here would offer to look after..............the cat (nearly said your pussy)

 

[ob]

If i was given an early diagnosis and i still had lucid times i would honestly take my own life if i could , i just wouldnt want to live on , i only have one brother who is ten yrs older than me and he might not be around to help nor would i want him too, we are not close so it would be a home for me and i wouldnt want that for myself

My sister tried that March last year but got saved (taking overdose)