I just wondered if any of you have experienced your spouse talking to him/herself. About 2 years ago I would come home from work & hear my husband upstairs & think that he was on the phone. But when I walked upstairs, he was just sitting there having a lively conversation with HIMSELF. He would make comments, then comment again as though someone else was talking to him. I'd ask him who he was talking to & he would get angry.
Now this is different from all of us who speak out loud when we are searching for something, etc. Like I'll say out loud, "Darn, I wanted to wear that pair of shorts, they're dirty." I'm talking about conversations! when I ask this question.
He never talks to himself in my presence. Yikes, I didn't know it was a symptom. I just thought he'd developed a habit of "thinking out loud." It's not like he babbles to himself all the time. I just thought it was weird. I didn't even make a note of it in my journal. I saw it on another thread & wondered.
My husband talks to "himself" as if there were another person in the room. And sometimes he tells me there is another person there. Usually they are threatening, but not always. I just think it's another aspect of the extreme confusion they experience.
My DH definitely talks to himself and has for a number of years. When he first started I never gave a thought to Alz. He was diagnosed last September and is in the mild stage according to his neuro. He also makes odd noises and if I walk into the room he acts like he was doing it on purpose. So I am assuming he knows he is doing it.
This morning when I got up my DH was gone. I thought he had gone for his walk but a few minutes later he was back. He had gone to the barber shop for a haircut and was mad that the barber didn't open until 8.30am. This was at 7.00am and I know he told me a few months ago the barber had changed from a later time to 8.30. There is no point in telling him about the change to 8.30 because he would just say the barber changed it again. Isn't it amazing how they can come up with things so they can't be wrong!!!!
First, let me state this: I DO NOT HAVE ALZHEIMER'S!
I have talked to myself for many years. I even answer myself on occasion! I am NOT demented, nor am I crazy. LOL I do find it a way to relieve stress, especially while driving in my car alone, if I am upset about something or upset with someone. It makes me feel better to get things off my chest, but not cause rifts with others. :)
My husband can barely string 2 or 3 words together, so he won't be developing this symptom! :)
It amazes me that so many of our spouses have these different symptoms and yet be at different stages. Strangely, it isn't bothering me that this is an Alzheimer's symptom that I seem to share! LOL
Jean, my husband has lost the ability to tell time. Plus he now confuses the days of the week. Your husband might start going to the barber shop on Sundays..... At least he can still go that far by himself. :)
The kind of taking to himself we are discussing is the kind where the person thinks there is another real person in the room who is not there. At least I think so.
I've "talked to myself" most of my life, but I know no one else is there. I started talking to myself because I was a latch key child in an empty apartment for hours every day. It was lonely and that way I actually heard the sound of someones voice. Back then there was no talking in school even when it would be perfectly reasonable to let kids talk, so basically if I didn't talk to myself, I never got to talk to anyone.
This is different. It is part of the whole hallucination symptom. They see someone who isn't there, and they talk to that someone. Or they see someone in the mirror and do not recognize themselves or their spouse. The seeing someone who isn't there is on a lot of symptom lists.
Mine has seen and speaks to entities all the time. for many yrs it seems some of his first symptoms were seeing people. he talks to the guys in the mirror and doesnt recognize himself but knows his name and mine. he frequently visits with his deceased brothers who were both doctors. he can describe their clothing /color/tie color???)which amazingly was a match to what they were buried in..hows that for scary? he nods -laughs-reaches out like touching, jokes out loud and tells me in the most nonchalant way, my brothers are here. With all the realness of it all, it seems to me maybe there is a parallell plane that we are unable to fathom in this world. at least its a comforting thought to think it could be true..today he seems focused on a lifesize modern art statue with a head and he so enjoys those visits:) its a strange world indeed...divvi
Val described what she observed as her husband having a lively conversation with himself.
And if we're gonna do true confessions, Mary, I do that. I'm two people and I do both sides of the conversation.
(Maybe I do have AD, but if this is an early warning sign, I was REALLY early onset ... been doing this for many years.)
I find that envisioning another person and how s/he might respond really helps me clarify my thoughts. It's been a very useful tool for writing grant applications and preparing to give presentations.
I don't get angry when I get caught, but I am a tad embarrassed.
I read somewhere, long ago, that talking to yourself this way is a sign of a high intellect and a very creative imagination. (Gosh, I sure hope so.)
So perhaps this kind of symptom -- going from holding a conversation with you-two, to talking to a nonexistent "real" person -- is associated with the original level of intelligence and/or creativity of the AD patient?
lets not get off on a tangent of who talks to our pets!!::::))))) thats a no brainer and i would think we ALL do it daily! ha. i wouldnt change that even if they said i was demented for doing it.:)divvi
My husband does not talk to himself but he has started to whistle. Not a tune, just noise.Cats and dogs are the best conversationalists!They always seem so agreeable.
I don't have any cats to talk to, but my husband talks to himself as if he is thinking out loud. His caregiver during the day says he does it more when he is bored. He doesn't do it when I am home because I keep him very busy with chores and he likes that.
My wife talks to herself all the time (if nothing else is going on). She usually can't tell me what she is talking about and it is so soft I can't be sure. But this is really nothing new. When we were first married, 54 years ago, and moved into our first apartment, she announced that we had to get either a baby or a dog because she talked to herself and the neighbors would think she was crazy. We got the dog!!!! :-)
My LO talks to mirrors. She can stay up all night muttering to the mirror.
The funny one was the other day when I took her to the restroom at the church. I help her wash her hands, then I wash mine. I got her done, and got mine done. I turned around to see her standing in front of the floor length mirror, frowning. "Well? Are you going to let me out?" She was really angry at the person in the mirror whom she assumed was blocking the doorway! And darned if every time SHE moved over, that rotten SOB moved to prevent her from leaving!!!
I know that at the later stages of this disease you sometimes have to take the mirrors out of the bathrooms, because they don't recognize themselves or their caregivers as the people in the mirror. I also know that sometimes in the later stages that they will talk to the person in the mirror. I know about it, but hearing about it from someone who has experienced it is quite different.
When he was smaller my grandson was fascinated by mirrors. There weren't any that he could see himself in easily at home, but we went to the Jazz Festival at Saratoga Springs every year and I've got photos from more than one year of him playing with the other little guy in the mirror. The first year when he wasn't walking yet, I'm not sure if he realized it was himself in the full length mirror. I have a set of photos from a year or two later where he obviously did know that was him in the mirror and was investigating the whole mirror image thing.
There is a web site where a caregiver who has been through the entire journey explains what is going to happen in terms of taking care of a child, except in reverse. I had already thought about it that way myself, so it really works for me as a metaphor.
Mine does that in his sleep, a murmer here and there but with tones you know are sincere. Sometimes he will laugh outlaoud in his sleep and turn his head and point in his sleep. Dr thinks it is related to the meds. It is hard to sleep when you doze off and someone starts talking to you when you least expect it! Not much sleep so I usually hit the pallet on the floor and turn on the fan to cover some of the noise
Val, I think you do what you have to do sometimes when the care is so demanding , you have to have some sleep. Mine isnt beauty sleep, but it sure keeps me from being irritable! LOL!
OOOOOO NOOOOOO! I was just reading the thread about the woman who was afraid to go to a support group, what would she tell her husband? (Like I would care! I'd just say I was going shopping.) Someone commented to find an early stage support group, because if you're mixed in with the ones whose spouses are incontinent, you get scared & never come back. That's sort of been the case with me on this site, to look into the future & know I'm not cut out for it, nor can I afford it. I don't have a 47 year marriage. I've already seen my husband through cancer. This has been no pleasure cruise for me. I don't have all the great years to look back on.
I worked all day refining my resume. I decided to put all this other stuff on hold & focus on myself. I need a job. After that, I can make choices.
My dad came home from a support group and never went back. He said all those people needed it worse than him, that they all had worse stories. Sadly, he's at the point of needing it now, but won't go.