Get the checkbook away from him. If you can get his credit cards too-make up some excuse like you lost yours and Visa cancelled the account for your safety. Women in my other group have been financially ruined by this behavior. It won't get better.

I have already removed any credit cards from his wallet. And he doesn't remember how to write a check....he can't sign his name. At first I felt terrible telling him he couldn't have want he wanted, so I just bought whatever.
He no longer drives so he can't buy anything alone. It's just the constant agitation he feels about my not wanting him to purchase more equipment.

This is a 57 year old man who has always bought what he wanted. It just amazes me that he doesn't remember his birthdate, SS#, our address or phone number, however, he can remember that a catalog came in the mail a month ago....I threw it away when he was napping.
I am on the Do Not Call List, however, he won't answer the phone. If I am not in the room the answering machine picks up. He won't even pick up if our sons are calling.

My husband forgot what I bought him for Christmas. He found a sweatsuit in the laundry basket & wanted to know if belonged to my son. He didn't even remember trying it on. That was the beginning of this January. Who knows what this Christmas will bring. Sounds like a good idea though, a list for Christmas.

This year we bought a car and a new couch and a digital frame because he had to buy something.

The car was reasonable. The old one was 8 years old and had had a few odd symptoms, but buying it at the beginning of the winter was not. I managed to hold him off until March.

There was noting wrong with the old couch and, in fact, we gave it away to a friend of my daughter's who was amazed at its condition. But I'll admit that the new couch really does fit what is happening to him. He cat naps in it every day and because it reclines, it cradles him. He isn't sleeping "funny" anymore.

I wanted the digital frame too, but I still spent too much money on it because of where it has to sit. But we both enjoy it.

I've managed to keep him from buying huge amounts of wine this year. We bought cases and cases from a winery in California last year. I told the saleswoman what was going on with him and she won't take another order from him without checking with me first. In fact, it turned out that we had been charged for someone else's wine - twice. She went out of her way to not only find out what had happened, she checked back in time until we were sure we had found all of the bad charges and she credited me.

We have a huge wine refrigerator that is filled with wine he won't live long enough to drink. Even worse, some of it needs to be drunk SOON and he doesn't understand why. And it is too bad because it was very good wine once upon a time. Wine used to be one of his passions.

He got a new DSLR camera last year before I realized he couldn't learn to use anything new. I know he wants another one, but he isn't getting it. Cameras were also one of his passions, but frankly he never really learned how to use any of the very expensive cameras we bought over the years.

At this point he can't make the kind of phone call that would result in an order, and I think he doesn't know how to use the Visa in his wallet. I'm going to be cancelling that account anyway, and not give him a card on the new account. Just in case.

He really doesn't have a clue about budgets or what things cost. Wine and cameras are the things that scare the living daylights out of me.

Wow! I hadn't thought about that! Since my DH doesn't go anywhere without me, he can't buy a new one, thank goodness!

I must admit that four years ago (and his AD had begun, but I didn't know it) he wanted a convertible. We had wanted one when we were in our twenties, but with four small children, a station wagon was our chosen mode of transportation. Anyway, we looked into the available convertibles, and decided on a Chrysler Sebring convertible. The kids refer to it as "Dad's Toy" and he loved to drive it with the top down at every opportunity. Last summer he stopped driving, but I take him out in his "toy" every chance I get. (I love it too!) So, I'm paying the insurance on two cars that only I drive, and tags and taxes and GAS. But, for now, I will continue to do so. Pleasures are fleeting.......

I remember a year or so ago being shocked to find out that DH had apparently ordered a couple of hundred dollars worth of magazines, mostly mags that he would have no possible interest in. (It was one of those companies where you can order multiple magazines and pay one fee.) He had no recollection of doing that, which was scary, because they had all our information. Thank goodness I was able to persuade them to let me cancel! We have caller ID and neither of us answers if it's not someone's number we recognize...We get the solicitation calls even though we're on the do not call list! Anyways, I can laugh about it now, sort of, but then it was very frightening. I took his credit cards after that and he doesn't carry much cash, doesn't drive so wouldn't have anyplace to spend it.

Kelly

Yesterday I spent 30 minutes on line with catalogchoice.org clearing out the junk i don't want. It is free and the list is long. I feel it is time well spent.

Thank you briegull. I've joined (in his name) and I've opted out from the two catalogs that scared me the most. I mean I DO NOT NEED another wine refrigerator. It turns out that it doesn't matter who's name I used since they ask you to type out the EXACT name on the catalog. Since there have been times when we got catalogs with really odd spellings of our names, that makes perfect sense.

Now I'll just follow up in a week or two and see if they had any luck with the process.

Yes. One of the catalogs required two spellings and I was able to include both.