Ok so husband started some strange behavior..example: years ago Robert was in a terrible car accident . he had some plastic surgery done on his face..so, we go to a new doctor last week. this doctor proceeded to take ear wax from Roberts ear.it took the guy forever and was a little painful..The little piece of wax looked like something was attached to it that looked like plastic.at any rate, since this happened Roberts ears have been popping a lot.we have a appt to get this checked. anyway here's where delusion comes into play..Robert wants to get an attorney because he says the piece doctor removed from his face was the size of a softball..he claims I did not see it He also wants us to go to doctors office to get piece of his face back!,,,! He brings this up to me almost daily..what do I even say to him? he is obsessed with it and I'm at a loss!. He started seraquel three days ago. I know it takes a few weeks to work..anyone else dealing with crazy delusions.
Redwold, i really don't have any advice for you but I certainly sympathize with you and the issues you are dealing with. My husband has AD, not FTD, but when he was having delusions & paranoia, I tried distracting him with a walk, a car ride, ice-cream or a beer! I knew that I couldn't reason with him and he was very difficult to distract most times, but usually food helped. I am not sure the same would hold true for someone with FTD.
Hopefully one of our FTD experts will be along to give you some better suggestions. But, again, I send support and good thoughts your way. Hang in there.
A little creativity is helpful. Once when we had just gotten into bed for the night, my DH started whispering to me questions about all of the people in the room. I asked him just a few questions about them, enough to determine some details of the hallucination. Then I said loudly, "OK, folks, we are going to go to sleep so you all need to go home." I waited a bit and asked him if everyone had left. He said no and pointed out a few stragglers. So I got up and said again, "Time to leave right now, and walked to the door as if I were ushering them out." Then I turned to him and said, "There. Everyone is gone and I am going to close the door to keep them out, so go to sleep."
He is in an ALF now, but still has hallucinations and delusions. Mostly I just agree with him because for the most part they are harmless. I often make up little stories to distract him and get him to physically move on. That often is enough to end the hallucination at that minute.
At first it can be very unnerving to hear someone talking so convincingly about something that isn't really there. I took my cue from monsters under the bed with children and the creative techniques for getting rid of them.
Hallucinations and delusions are symptoms of brain disease, much as rashes and muscles cramps might be symptoms of a different disease. If you frame it that way and consider it a game for you to figure out what puts your DH back at ease, it can all be manageable. I also learned from this site that there are so many worse things that we could be dealing with it made me grateful for a benign symptom (relatively). If it all becomes too distressful for your DH, there are medications that can help.
Have you tried telling Robert that you have a call into an attorney and are waiting for a call back? Or telling him that the doctor will put the piece of his face back in place? Have you had him look in a mirror to show you what is missing? You may need to write this down and hand the note to the doctor and then HOPE that he has enough imagination to come up with a strategy to put back what seems to be missing while assuring your DH that everything is getting fixed. You, in the meantime, are saying in the background, "Oh, yes, that fixes it, doctor. Excellent job. That should feel so much better, Robert." And then hope. But do know that if you extinguish one hallucination, another might take its place.
Redwold, did he have delusions before the seroquel? I ask because some medications can cause delusions/paranoia. Before my husband was dx'd with FTD he had an unspecific dx of "pre-senile dementia", probably AD. Doctor put him on Namenda and after 2 days on the 10 mgs dose, he started having delusions and hallucinations. Once off Namenda, he got better.
The delusions started on Father's Day.he has only been on seraquel four days thus far. The last thing I told him (when he wanted me to take him to doctor to get piece of face back) was that since we are in a rural area it's a visiting doctor and, he won't be in till end of month. that seems to be working for now. I will also tell him that I put a call into an attorney and I am waiting on call back. I was so stressed last night..I just could not sleep. For me, I had to keep reminding my self toLet Go and Let God . thanks everyone. Every little bit of advice is helping so much
Redwold, the delusions and hallucinations are so hard to witness, especially when they are the type that cause our loved ones distress and fear. You are doing a fine job of distracting him and giving him answers he could accept. I like Marche's idea of putting the piece back. Have you called his doctor and explained what is happening? If he has a heart, maybe he would set up an appointment to "fix" your DH. And perhaps tweak his medications to try to ward off these delusions.
I also found that with the delusions and paranoia, some of the AD meds they put us on made it worse. the hallucinations improved for us after we were off Aricept and Namenda. but that's probably not feasible with recent diagnosis as most drs recommend one of the meds for dementia. you may want to ask about one of the others if hes having noticeable changes. its overwhelming I know to have to deal with the constant anxiety. it does appear to lessen as time moves on at least in our case. my DH was diagnosed with AD/vascular dementia but with all the hallucinating I always suspected a bit of lewy body/and or ftd. its a guessing game.
It has been advised by many professionals in the AD field - When they can no longer live in your world, you have to live in theirs. Simply put, you have to go along with their fantasy and distract them as much as possible. Marche's post is a perfect example of that.
Last Sunday, when I went to visit Sid, he was back in 1964 when he joined the Air National Guard. He told me that he had applied to the Guard and was waiting to hear if he had been accepted. He said he was "in limbo" waiting to hear. He was also "in trouble" because now he had changed his mind, and didn't want to join. He was very upset and worried that he would be accepted. I told him not to worry about it - that I would make sure he didn't have to go if he didn't want to. He was surprised and relieved to hear that I could take care of it for him. He also thought that the NH staff were National Guard members, but had changed out of their uniforms. I just agreed with him, and changed the subject, at which point he settled down.
I'm late getting into this discussion, but my husband has delusions regarding who I am for one thing. Most of the time he thinks I am his brother, sometimes a female friend and sometimes his wife. I don't know how to talk to him because from minute to minute he can change who he thinks I am. He always wants to go home to where his wife and kids are (our children are adults with families of their own.) I can usually distract him for a time but this issue is constant. He has back pain and is convinced there are doctors at his other house who can take care of the problem. He has arthritis and is seeing an orthopedic doctor. I hope these delusions go away soon.
katlady...will he get in the car with you and go for a short ride if you tell him you are going to take him home? Then after you get back to your real home he may be more accepting, or he may have forgotten about what was upsetting him. You may also be able to convince him that you spoke to his doctor for him?
One of the harder parts for me was watching my wife move past the loss of nuances and skills and become confused about who I was and what was going on. In early onset AD which we had it never stopped moving and every three months later was different in some major way. Not everyone with EOAD had that though I noticed.
I had similar experiences to what you're going through and for us they did change in the sense that less than a year later my wife was no longer capable of stringing together semi-reasonable concepts to explain what she was happening to her. Thus, we went into the lecture and tours period where my wife was explaining to the people on the tours in our house what they were seeing and gave long rambling lectures to the hall mirror. That didn't last either.
Dementia is a very hard disease on the caregiver. I hope that you can find ways to stay strong.
Hi katlady, What you're describing is very common and many people on this site have reported how they have handled it. I think most of their advice was to avoid trying to reason with their spouses, and to try to reassure them and distract them. I'm going to search for some of those other threads and bring whatever I find to the top for you.
I'm not sure who my husband thinks I am. He has introduced me as his wife, his "girl" or "sweetheart," his sister, and his mother. I usually answer his questions and demands without getting too specific. Sometimes that's because I'm not clear about who he thinks I am but usually it's because I don't want to lock myself into one role. I think the most important thing is that he trusts me, so I make sure that he knows I am listening carefully to what he wants and that I am on his side and I'm his friend.
Thank you Myrtle. It's so comforting to have all of you on this forum and to know I'm not alone. We just got back from lunch and when my DH said "thank you buddy" I knew I was seen as being his brother. I just said "you're welcome."
don't get into detailed explanations. it goes in one out the other. and within short times it will be back for discussion again! ha. find something you know he enjoys and distract distract distract. don't elaborate and a short quick , we can do that later, and change the subject. delusions are very much in the forefront with dementia. check with his dr on his meds if they get worse. divvi*
Yes, don't try to explain things to him, or correct him, or contradict him. It will get you nowhere, and probably make things worse. Just kind of go along with whatever he's saying, but try to distract him in some non-upsetting kind of way.