Who at the nursing home where my husband is (in Florida....I'm in Virginia) should I talk to to insist that he be put on medications to control his abusive, combative behavior? This is an emergency situation. There was a meeting about him today but no talk about medications. I'm afraid he'll hurt himself again, he gets so out of control. Calls to insist I come get him. He's not been discharged by his doctor and I can't make hilm understand that. He screams all kinds of accusations and gutter talk at me over the phone that I know everyone can hear. They must think I'm some kind of whore, the way he describes me. When I tell him I can't come get him...again explaining I have to fly to come see him, he hasn't been released he tells me to go F.... my "buddy", that's why I'm making him stay there. There is no reason for him to talk like that to me. WHO SHOULD I INSIST ON TALKING TO IN THE MORNING TO GET SOME ATTENTION ABOUT PSYCH. MEDICATIONS TO MAKE HIM MORE RATIONAL????? iT'S AN EMERGENCY and I feel like no one is doing anything. He makes me feel like nothing. I know I shouldn't give him so much power, but I swear, all l can do after a bout like this one today is stay in bed for the next 24 hours. Its been going on like this for days. I DO get help with my problem....it just isn't working. Just wanna lie down and not wake up again than be treated like this.

oh,god bless you. i would talk to his nurse,dr,administrator over the nursing home whoever i needed to start with. tell them the situation and insist on him getting something to calm him down. do they just let him call you whenever he wants to? you maybe should talk to them about limiting the phone to him or taking it out of his room. you have to take care of yourself. remember,it's the disease talking,not him,but it still hurts. you are depressed and rightly so,are you taking anything to help you through this? i know how you feel,there are times i just want to go to sleep and not wake up,but i do alot of praying for strength and somehow,i am able to go on. my dh is 53 with eoad, he is now in stage 7. he weighs 132lbs now. we are getting hospice help now. honey,if i can do this,you can too. we all have to stick together. this site has been a lifeline for me when i didn't think there was one. take care of your self,stay in touch with us and let us know what happens. we are here. i and extending a warm heart and a big hug to you. my god wrap his loving arms around you.

stuntgirl, I’m no expert on this, so this is just my opinion. I would think that the nursing home and doctors would want your husband as manageable as possible and that they would already have him on any meds that would help. So I would think that his state of mind now is probably as good as you’re going to have. Can you deal with him as he is now on a day to day basis?

AMEN!!

StuntGirl, I also wonder why you are so determined to bring him back? But that being said, I also understand (I think) why. As others have said, unplug the phone. Can't you speak with his doctors? Personally I think they are best to determine what type of meds to give him. The staff knows how he is, let them help. Didn't you have phone issues last week as well? I know as caregivers we hold on to the short lucid moments, but if I remember correctly there were issue last week as well. You really need to get everything on a even keel before allowing him to come home. And in my opinion your never to old to learn something new!

thank you, phranque, and all the others. I just feell so miserable. Now, he won't even talk to me. Just calls and leaves one liners about what a whore I am. I heard him screaming at oone of his caretakers, as well. So, I guess everyone knows. I've always been a private person. It hurts me that he's spouting all his nastiness toward me to anyone who will listen. I believe they probably believe him. I'm 54 and he's 80. Every one wonders why we are even a couple. He used to take good care of me ( I thought) and love me ( I thought). Wish I DID have a boyfriend or ANYone to make this tolerable. I miss having a normal life like that. Love, kisses, wishes and all that.

You will learn never to get embarrased aout the behavior of a alz patient...
we all miss the normal life, but for me that is gone and will never be back....we lost my wife to alz, and she is no longer the person we knew...yes she is still alive, but no longer the person she used to be....
hang in there, and remember the good times....

Phranque, this is very interesting. I believe every word you're saying, don't get me wrong. But I can't remember seeing any of the other men who came to this site having witnessed their spouses being so consistently foul in their behavior to them. Many women have husbands who threaten them, assault them, etc - I just haven't seen any men. I wonder why that is.

I had a friend who would tell me about what a harridan his alz. mother had become, just awful. And years later, HE became the same way!!

Have you talked to her neuro about meds to calm her down? As we say here, the pharmacy is your friend...

stuntgirl, is there a monetary motivation for you to bring him home to live? to save the monies going for the facility hes in now? you said you were using food stamps on one prior post. will you have access for additional monies to live on ifyou bring him home? i am asking cause if this is the motivation to bring him home. i can understand that point of view- the detrimental issues of bringing him to live with you like he is -is not rational. i havent seen one reply yet that is condoning your thinking of having him live with you yet here. all of us are concerned you are not mentally strong enough to deal with his behavour issues once he is home. med or no med.even if he was a lamb the everyday caring of an AD grown man who may be incontinent and in a wheelchair is very consuming and complicated both physically and mentally. with your own personal issues you have had in your past you should think if you are really strong enough to handle this. if you have to put him in a nursing home how will you pay and continue to run your farm? maybe if you are serious you should sell the property and move into something smaller near him and use the excess monies to live on. after saying all this, if you are still contemplating bringing him to live with you, then get on a plane and go back there and get some answers up close and personal with whomever is in charge of his care. speak to his dr and play the recordings to show how aggressive he is towards you- you should also talk to his atty about how you will gain POA for his care and what will your status for finances be once he is home with you. there are just way to many loose ends and unanswered questions for you and you should be more concerned with answers first. i agree that it sounds more pertinent for you to get your own personal issues in line first ==so you will be able to handle the future.
your problems may be compounded once you have him home unless to take actions now. divvi

Jen, you need to admit yourself to a rehab facility and get through this. It's the only way you will be able to save yourself, your farm and do everything else you want to do. You were in rehab before, and you need to call the same place because they know you and will take care of you. It will be the bravest thing you have ever done. Go do it right now. Pretend we are all there helping you. You need some help. Call them right now and ask them to come get you. We love you. Be brave and make the call.

* phranque You are not a whimp. You are a man that has values and self control. You value your wife and because she is your wife and female, refuse to repay violence for violence. Be kind to yourself - you deserve it.

briegull, it sounds as if phranque's wife may actually have Lewy body dementia. Patients with LBD are very sensitive to antipsychotics and do not respond well to them at all. My mother was diagnosed with AD, but my father (a doctor) became convinced she had LBD. There's a sweet lady on the AlzAssoc forum struggling to care for her mother, who also appears to have LBD, and I just don't know how she manages to face each new day. It's purely awful.

phranque, have you tried galantamine (Razadyne generic)? Sometimes LBD patients will respond well to that...

Phranque and Everyone,

Pranque is NOT, NOT, NOT, the only man whose AD wife is combative and assaults him. Believe me. A couple have written about it on these boards (way back somewhere in the 2000 posts - it would take a computer itself to find it). What you who write on these boards DO NOT SEE are the e-mails I receive from those who are too embarrassed to write about it publicly. This miserable disease is totally non-biased - it possesses the brains of both men and women. It's just that it is so unpredictable and affects everyone differently - "When you've seen one AD patient, you've seen ONE AD patient."

Stuntgirl - just my opinion, but I wouldn't even consider bringing him home.

joang

Starling, that is an EXCELLENT suggestion. That's just what the hot line is for.

Not hearing from Jen worries all of us. She has told us in previous posts that when her husband was home in Virginia, he had some violent episodes and she called the police to come to her assistance. They took him to the hospital and he ended up in the psyche ward. Jen said that at that time, she told the doctors and the police that he could not come home. His sister agreed to bring him to Florida and into her home for a few weeks. Florida was his original home and is where he had a successful medical practice before he retired. While with his sister, he suffered compression fractures in his back and he went from a hospital in Florida into a nursing home. His son, from a previous marriage, is a Florida attorney, and (I think this is correct..) the attorney son was granted full guardianship of his father. He transferred his bank accounts and other assets to Florida. This left Jen (Stuntgirl) in a huge financial crisis. She had been injured in a horseback riding accident (she shows hunters and jumpers) and as a result of her injuries, became seriously addicted to narcotic drugs prescribed to allieviate her pain. She eventually had to go into a drug rehabilitation center where she successfully overcame the addiction. Jen and her husband had two children together, a boy and a girl. The boy died of a drug overdose a few years ago when he was 21, and her daughter is addicted to alcohol. His children from a former marriage live in Florida and want their father to stay there.

Jen has explained this in her posts and one email to me a month or so ago. I hope everyone will ocntinue to urge her to return to the doctors who helped her regain her strength in the past. She needs to bring her young 54 year old mind and body back to a better place so she can develop the strength to 'accept the things she cannot change.' She has endured very difficult and tragic recent years and I would expect it has gotten the best of her. She needs understanding, love and professional help to pull herself out of this quagmire. God bless her.

She knows we are her friends through thick and thin..and understand how difficult this has to be for her. That's why we are here. I hope that she understands that we are thinking about her health FIRST when we all encourage her to wait until she is stronger before she tries to assume the care of her husband. I speak for myself when I urge her to consider that the person he is today is not the man she married over 25 years ago. It was very VERY hard for me to accept that fact. But facts are facts.

Nancy Reagan called it the Long Good Bye. It truly is.