79 year old mother with mid-stage dementia heard me talking to her 86 year old sister on the phone and got jealous. Her sister is staying in her own house and mom is about to be moved from an IL apartment to assisted living or memory care, depending on the nurse's assessment. She's delusional and hallucinates so I'm assuming memory care.
This is only part of mom's screed.
I couldn't make this stuff up. Is this level of anger even normal?
"I hope I drop dead in the worst way possible and get tangled up in your throat and snap you in two!"
"I hope you rot. I wonder how many cancers you're going to come up with before next Christmas."
"I'm liable to kick you in the side in a minute don't be surprised. I hate you, you no-good b***h."
She said my aunt and I could go be hookers together. Then she tore up paper, and threw it around the room along with some pens.
I pray I never talked to my loved ones that way.
I once babysat a 4yr old. She got angry at something & wrote me a note with I Hat Yoo. Ouch.
Your Mother possess a full vocab & a very creative turn of phrase. Worthy of the best powerful Queen in a drama series. I think I'd be tempted to play along, to reply Yes Ma-am with a curt nod. As you wish Ma'am. Then click my heels & leave the room.
Unless of course she has always been a very unpleasant woman; were that the case I would suggest you make visits few, short and sweet.
She needs meds for her agitation (and for hallucinations).
I don't think ALZ includes hallucinations...
I watched some Teepa Snow videos on YouTube which explained how dementia affects the brain and why these behaviors are the ones that dominate towards the end. It helps to know and understand why they can't help it.
That's one of her go-to's.
They can be quite evil talkers at times.
I know a family who went through hell with their mom. Their mother chased them around their home with scissors. She was trying to stab them.
They had to hide all sharp objects. They knew then that they could no longer keep their mom in their home and placed her.
Your mom will never again be the mother who raised you, which is incredibly sad for you and for her.
Just like there are some angry drunks .
If I get dementia, I also pray to be the happy , pleasant , cooperative drunk .
I've had some rough talking biddies come at me with this nonsense. I think these women were army drill sargents in a former life to develop a colorful vocabulary like that. Just awful. It takes the patience of Job to deal with this. Some people are better at than others. I'm not. Someone said it's the disease talking. In Al-Anon, they say the same thing. It's the disease talking. However, it doesn't mean that we stick around and absorb this poison.
It seems like you do have a choice here. Tell her that you are not going to hang around when she starts talking like this to you. Leave the room. I figured out a long time ago that if you continue to stay and take that type of verbal abuse (disease or not) they will continue on. My Al-Anon sponsor told me to go outside and take one of Al-Anon books with me and a flashlight. I did this in the deadset of winter one time. I left ma in the house with that noise. If she fell and broke something, I would call 911. I was no longer willing to be an emotional punching bag for her or anyone else for that matter. What she said to me would make the hair on a sheep's a## uncurl. It was just horrible.
I had clients yell and scream at me. They call it elder rage. Some will even go as far as attacking the caretaker and others in the home. It is time for memory care at this point and time. There are people who drank alcohol all of their lives develop health issues down the line, and become a nightmare to the person stuck with taking care of them in the home. Usually, the person (the wife) will end up in worse shape than the alcoholic.
This is feeling to me like the metoo# movement. I was sexually harassed on a job, that I left, instead of dealing with it. When me to# came about, I was blown away. As I am with all these stories
I'm so sorry for all your going through blue, this has to be so hard
This is why someone will urinate in public, fondle themselves in public, swear and talk in a manner that they never would have before.
When she gets agitated try redirecting.
Validate what is happening and redirect. So in this case you might say... "Mom, I'm talking to Aunt Betty, I am sorry you are upset, let's go get some tea."
Please talk to her doctor about the outbursts, the delusions and hallucinations.
If mom does not yet have an accurate diagnosis it might be wise to get one if possible. Different dementia's have different "symptoms" or "quirks" and if you know what type of dementia you are dealing with you can plan for some of the differences.
And you might pray that you don't talk to loved ones like that but you may never know what your future holds.
So be kind and understanding now, speak gently so that when you do say something out of character your family will know it's the disease and a broken brain not you talking.