Once a week I divvy up his pills into one of those little weekly boxes. Blue for morning, yellow for evening. I give him the day's pills morning and evening. He always asks me what they are for. I tell him they are for his BP and his memory. He says he doesn't have memory problems but if it makes me feel better, he'll take them.
I'm really sorry you are having these problems. I feel very fortunate at this time that his meds are not an issue.
FayeBay - I haven't eperienced what you are up against but if I did - I would remove all the meds to where he can't get them or not know where they are. I would buy the daily pill boxes with 2 or 3 compartments and the drugstore has those little medicine plastic cups you can buy. I would pour the ones he needs into the cup and tell him these are his BP meds and Dr. ___says for him to take them from this cup. Other choice is to buy a crusher and crush them and add to food so he doesn't know he is taking pills. Another choice I would probally go with is have the Dr. prescribe something to mellow out his mood. Hope some of this helps. My Mom was very picky about what pills she was taking. She would lay them out on the table in a line and repeat their name and how many she was to take. I took a sheet of paper and glue one of each of her pills down along with its name and what it was for. I divided them by morning, supper and bedtime. I told her Dr.-----said that was right and she was to take them.
After a trip to the ER because of possible overdosing--Took all of Wed.,Thurs., and started Fri.'s between Wed. am an Thurs. am--I took over total control. Bought a tackle box and padlock. Already had a weekly dispenser tray with 4 compartment sticks for each day. Just told him we had to make sure there were no more mistakes. Now I count everything out on Sat. night. Call in any needed refills to be picked up when grocery shopping later. Each night I pour one compartment of the next day's stick into a pill bottle, and set out the one for the morning. The rest are locked up. I've been lucky that he has always been good about taking his meds. He just can't handle the timing and counting himself anymore. He has 10 Rxs and 2 OTC's he takes, and hasn't a clue which is which or which does what.
time to take over the pill dosing. there will be alot of things they dont want us to help with but for safety issues well-its just not a choice. hide the pills and bring out the daily ones morning in one dose and wait til pm to do the same. my DH was spitting them out when i wasnt looking and went days without BP or AD meds so he became quite ill and you never knew what happened. if he doestn cooperate leave and try again a bit later. or offer something in return for taking the meds. candy works here for just about anything! something to mellow him out some is a good choice too if hes aggressive. and crushing them in food is the other good choice too. we all resort to what works best. Divvi
I had to take over my husband's meds last week. I put his pills in a 7 day pill case and write the day of the week on the dry erase board but last week he took his pills for Thursday and then decided the day of the week on the fridge was wrong, erased it and wrote Friday and then took his Friday pills. At least he doesn't take any pills for bp or heart and only needs to take them in the morning--just his aricept, antidepressant and cholesterol--I keep his risperdal separate and hand that to him in the late afternoon. Now I place his next morning's pills in a little red cup. If he insists he forgot to take his pills I tell him to check the cup and if its empty he took them. This has worked--this week at least. I have never had trouble with him taking medications and when he balked about my taking over his pills I told him I was just worried about him and didn't want anything to happen to him. That seemed to work.
Hopefully you will be able to find a way that works for you.
One thing that was really helpful for me with DH and taking pills.
His neuro told him, in forceful terms, that I was to take care of his medication every morning and evening. He was to listen to me, as I knew what was best for him and would keep him out of trouble! That was included in our visit when the neuro also told him....NO MORE DRIVING. God bless the neuro (He gets it!). I do have to tell DH what each pill is for, every day. He huffs and puffs, but he does take them without much fuss. If he starts, I let him know that I will call his dr. He grumbles but then takes them.
For newbies..... maybe it would be helpful to adopt what some of us do, fax or telephone the doctor before appointments and let them know your needs. I usually do a pre-appointment update fax of dh's state of health and mind, along with any issues that have developed over the last three months. It works well and puts us on the same page with alerts of advancement in the disease. In our case, FTD (issues of anger, agression and inappropiate behavior).
My wife has never tried to take extra pills. My big problem has been getting her to take them. She would put the pill in her mouth and then either chew it, or tuck it under her tongue while drinking the water. Now I grind all her pills (except for a small one - glipizide for diabetes - which she will take with her coffee). I put the ground up pills in apple sauce along with 1 Tablespoon of MCT oil twice a day. So far she eats this with no argument.
My DH use to come back for more pills, or he would complain of stomach pain or headaches too often, I eventually bought different types of hard candy to give him, like the round pink mints that taste like peppermint ( I would give that for stomach aches) or tic-tac-mints (I would give him for headaches). This kept the arguments down, and he was happy to have another pill.
My husband has FTD also..Aricept made him horrible, he is on the smallest dose of Namenda possible as increasing it made him horrible also. His Neuro wants to put him on Razadyne also, but I think NO. I'm done with this meds meddling...not a winning situation.
Kathi37, My husband also has FTD. He was on Namenda & Razadyne ER before diagnosis in July. His Neurologist was going to stop both...he doesn't think either help FTD. We stopped the Razadyne, however, I didn't want to stop the Namenda. I see no difference without the Razadyne, so I don't think it was helping at all.