A lot of the affecteds seem to acquire an unusual interest in paper products....the best thing would be to keep the paper towels, tissues and toilet paper out of sight. I know it is an inconvenience, but it sometimes saves money on plumbing repairs....my husband once tried to put a whole roll of paper towels down the toilet....BIG bill.....
Mine arranges paper napkins all over the tablecloth within reach. He cuts up an orange (still can do that veery neatly) and arranges the segments all over these napkins. I just buy the cheapest napkins and let him play. Here we ago again, the kids playing with their food!
Herenow, Try rubber bands! Not fun I know, I haven't figured out how to curb the obsession with them. I ask Dh why but he can't answer why he finds them so interesting. I know my FIL was into paper products as well, and he tried flushing a few rolls of TP as well as Depends! Opp's! Interesting what they find fascinating. Rk
I find it odd so many things many of you are experiencing we have not. I consider my dh a solid 5 with some 6 and he has never did the repitious things, anxiety, verbal abuse, physical abuse. This whole thing is pretty confusing to me.
Herenow, for some reason, they often need to have something in their hands to do. At various stages, it shows up in interesting ways. At one point he was ripping napkins to shreds. Now we just hand him a rolled up towel and that keeps him happy.
Imohr - enjoy the belessings you have been given, the disease moves in very strange twists and turns with many people.
At this point my husband doesn't do any of that stuff. For a while he was taking things out of wastebaskets and putting them in the toilet. Mostly it was used tissues, but I worried that he would put something bad in the toilet so I stopped using the wastebaskets. They are still there, but they are empty.
Imohr, I really think that a lot of these symptoms are a range. And some of them happen very early. So, my husband had the repeated question thing over a year before he was diagnosed, but except for needing to know which day was garbage day, he didn't do much of it at all.
I had ONE violence episode. The verbal abuse mainly was some mean spiritedness. Today, for example, he was hungry for lunch and I was working on the bills and missed noon by 5 minutes. So he was a tad grumpy. But I suggested we go to our favorite diner, and that was the end of that.
His pacing is basically standing around in my way when I'm trying to make and clean up after dinner. Then he settles back down for the rest of the evening. Shadowing is coming into the computer room to sit on the couch and stare out the window if I've been in here too long. Basically the low end of the range or spectrum.
I'm not dealing with a lot of the stuff some of our fellow caregivers deal with and my husband is basically at the same stage yours is at. A solid 6 (ALL they symptoms) and a few stage 6 symptoms (all speech and cognition with no physical symptoms).
count your blessings ladies and gents who have none of the less tolerable issues:) i would just try keeping the paper products in a cabinet out of sight or like some just give a roll and let them have at it for fun.. my hooligan has come up with a new fun diversion. hes been so good about getting to the bathroom to go lately (coconut oil:) but now decides he wants to pee over all the stacked toilet rolls that sit next to the toilet oh so cutsey..lets see about 5 of them were soaked to the core! not a drop in the toilet...see, i think its rather funny now that i got it all cleaned and thrown out..i now have lined the whole area around the toilet with thick towels so he can go without messing stuff up and have to wash them daily! breathe, breathe.... its possible to turn a blind eye but its taking lots of patience ..Divvi
Would it be possible to put puppy pee pads around the toilet and just throw the whole mess out? Not good for ecology but also not using water. Remember the controversy when disposable diapers came out
Believe me, I am thankful for not having some of the issues some of you are having. It just makes me wonder sometimes if I am imagining things and the Dr. dia. is wrong, and then something comes along to wake me up.
My husband is obsessed with his wallet, jets, the sun & the moon. He checks the money in his wallet at least 20 times a day. He has had $40.00 in there for couple years...doesn't know how to count 20's anymore, however, he loves to take them out & place them back. Loves, to yell out when I am driving that "There's one"...meaning a jet. I guess if he gets pleasure from these things, that's all that matters.
Kadee my DH was obsessed with flags. :) any kind any size. we counted thousands during that phase. he would do the same, 'theres one! we would always comment on the colors and size...sigh-.isnt this a strange disease..
bluedaze, i have tried puppy pads, they are more money i think to do that than just washing a load in cold water every couple of days.and he wont step on the paper it makes noise:) i used only! off white towels that blend with the carpets or we wont use the toilet .and i already have soooo many depends in the trash..its shameful. divvi
Kadee, my husband is the same with his wallet. I know how much he has in his wallet. (not much. LOL) I learned yesterday not to leave any money laying out. Normally he never touches anything on my dresser. I put $40.00 out to remind me to get gas. When I went to get dressed, it was gone. I confronted him. Of course, he didn't take it. I asked to look in his wallet andf sure enough there was an extra $40.00 there. Of course he denied taking it. Funny tho. he didn't give me much of an argument when I took it back.
Divi, when I get upset over things he does, I alway think of you and realize that I don't have it too bad.
I heard the funniest thing on NPR today. This guy is a behavioral psychologist, I think, and he talks about the simple ways to motivate people to do things. Maybe you read in the last few days about an electric company getting usage to cut down by giving people ratings of smileys or frowney faces when their electrical usage is compared to neighbors'. Well, he had another one: a fly in the urinal. In Holland, I think it started, they painted a fly - etched it into the porcelain - near the drain in some public urinals. The men all go for it and it has, as they said, "reduced spillage." SO that's what I think we need to do: give the men a target!
It's true: look at http://urbanlegends.about.com/library/bl_fly_in_urinal.htm
I guess I have to tell you all what I did with the urinals at the resort we owned. Of course I didn't think to have it painted in the urinal but our Men's room decor was fishing lodge cabin theme. I had a craft-er paint me a rather large sign with a big fish measuring picture on it, that read, Please stand Closer, It's not as long as you think!!!!! At first Dh was like someone is gonna be offended, I was like so.............................. But honestly, more men laughed at it and would end up taking their spouses on a tour of the Men's room just to see it. Or tell their buddies you gotta go check out the urinals. Rk
Herenow, In my humble opinion I think your wife's cosmetics are more important. Big Grin! Bless her heart, she still wears pantyhose? God Love her! I gave those up the minute I quit the corporate world.
That was very loving thing to do when she had her mishap. Rk
Herenow, Could she 'run out of panty hose?' Have knee high ones on hand and other choices. She could 'make do" until you can get out to buy more (whenever)? Or only have 1-2 pair left, and save them for special events (Church, out to dinner,...)? Work your way out of them.
How to get your wife out of pantyhose? Try to get her to plant some gourds! The only sensible use I ever saw for pantyhose was supporting heavy gourds on an arbor -- you place the gourd inside and tie the waist opening shut and then tie the legs to the arbor up above the gourd. (I'm certainly glad I didn't have to contend with girls wearing pantyhose back when I was courting!)
Thigh high hose are still "in". I just bought some at Nordstrom that have elastic at the top--no need for a garter belt. Maybe Herenow's wife could swith to those, then work her way down to trouser stockings.
Imohr - I do the same as you - I wonder if it is all me despite he has his bad days and then it is obvious that he has AD. I think AD does a number on my mind as well as his. But as I look at our life in the last few years, there have been lots of changes that have been necessary to adjust to his AD.
We like to go to our granddaughters basketball games. She is in the 7th grade. Went tonight and he used his transport chair, as usual. Had to take him to the bathroom twice while we were out. He is able to manage himself in the bathroom but it takes him forever. It is quite a chore managing outings like this, but is one of the few things he enjoys.
We were at a place one time years ago where they had a unisex bathroom. Over the toilet was this sigh:
Gentlemen, please stand close. It's shorter than you think. Ladies, please remain seated for the entire performance."
Some people have the greatest sense of humore. If anyone was offended by this, I never heard about it.
And I never realized that DH's beharior was rather typical. He has an old pocket watch that he constantly winds. He checks every clock in thehouse with his watch at least 20 times a day. He's always resetting it. He also checks his wallet frequently. He has $35 in various size bills. He can still count it. Has trouble with coins, however.
My husband can also still count paper money, or at least he could last week. <grin> Things change fast around here.
One of the non mini-mental questions the neurologist asked during the first visit was about coins. He held up two quarters and asked my husband what they were called, and how much the two coins were worth. He got both questions wrong. That was almost 2 years ago. Late stage 4 or early stage 5.
He had been emptying his pockets into jars of coins for years at that point. Just didn't like carrying around coins because they were heavy? Or didn't know what they actually were? Don't have a clue, but I think being able to use coins goes early.