Any experience in this? - Alzheimer's Disease & Dementia Message Board

skimps46 · 10-30-2008, 10:27 PM

As I stated in "Oh my gosh you guys" thread, I know you are all right about daddy. I have a dr appt Mon @ 11:30 to discuss.

But here's a new wrinkle. I have not seen this discussed, so maybe y'all can help me with this: Dad usually sleeps a lot. 18 hrs a day, usually. But yesterday and especially today, he has been wired like a 9 day clock. It happened all of a sudden, and it's wearing us both out.

I canNOT get him to sit still. I take his blood pressure 3x a day, and I haven't gotten a good reading for 2 days now because he will not be still. Even when I have him seated at the table, he is drinking his coffee, picking his teeth, blowing his nose...and if I tell him to just be still for a hot second, he does for about 5 seconds, then he is all moving around again. Reaching, scratching, moving. Constant motion. He is outside. Inside. Outside. Inside. Fooling around in the tool shed. "Cleaning" trash cans. (He has no hose - I took it away without his knowledge, so he sweeps out trash cans. Clean trash cans. Unused brand new trash cans.) He stripped all the covers off his bed today. When I asked him why he did that, he said, "Just raisin' hell". Tonight, while we were at church and my daughter was watching him, he had a 30 minute "episode" with the baby powder - putting on the stupid fat dog, all over himself...daughter didn't know what to do with him. It was pitch dark outside when she finally MADE him go in the house, and he was not appreciative of the demand, either.

The frenetic activity level is exhausting. He cannot walk worth a darn - just a shuffle, 2" at a time, and I stay with him cuz he does fall every now and again.

Between the assault on the landlord and this crazy frantic restlesness, I can't figure out what the heck is going on. I had to explain 6 times that his trash can goes out street side today for the garbage man. He just can't understand why I took it to the street. He can't get any kind of sentence out, I don't know what he wants, and I don't know how to settle him down. Is restlessness common? How does this differ from "terminal restlessness"? What in the heck to I do?

Any ideas? This is toooooooo weird.....

...lil' deb

Gabriel · 10-30-2008, 10:47 PM

That kind of sudden change in behavior might be because of a UTI. Remember all the bizzare things Mom did before the care meeting we had on here, only to find out it was a UTI? Can you take a urine sample in tomorrow to be checked? If that is not the case then it could be new behavior as he shuffles along the path of this diease and even more reason placement or inhome help. Remember the night I spent with Dad walking the halls going to check on the little boys and his recent fall in the bathroom and as he was checking the place. No UTI or other cause... just something he is doing more frequently now. There may be a reason for the behavior but it is not for you to know. It is something locked in his head that he can't explain. The things he is doing are the same things he has done before... just on a grander scale. It may perhaps be terminal restlessness but that is for your doctor to determine on Monday. More than likely it is either a UTI or his need to get things done. It may be nothing more than he is actually feeling better than he has and therefore able to do more. If so medication may be in order but again... your doctor would be the best one to determine a cause but be sure to get a urinalysis done ASAP.

Or perhaps he is trying to tell you it's time?

Love, deb

Martha H · 10-31-2008, 05:31 AM

Could he be helping himself to large amounts of medicine? Prescription or over the counter drugs can cause such agitation. Make sure he has no access to drugs.

Good luck!

Love,

Martha

ibake&pray · 10-31-2008, 09:19 AM

lil Deb,

He knows it's time also....

skimps46 · 10-31-2008, 07:55 PM

I know. I think he knows. We all know. And most of all, God knows. It's time.

Ever since this weird activity level began, he has been even more diminished cognitively. Today, I took over his fried egg and cheese sandwich and a bowl of apple salad for lunch (his favorite, favorite, favorite lunch), and found him sitting on his sofa. He no longer sits like we do, with your bottom against the back of the sofa and sitting upright. His bottom apparently hits the center of the sofa cushion, and he leans back - it looks odd, and cannot be comfortable. Anyway, he looked like hell. Pale. Vacant. He had just come in from outside (the trash bin that got dumped yesterday and returned to the back porch apparently needed to be rolled back out to the street), and I still don't know what happened to him. I said, "What's wrong, daddy?" And he just looked at me. I grabbed the blood pressure cuff, and his bp was fine, so I gave him a drink of iced tea, and he seemed to brighten. He ate his lunch, and then started talking again.

Now be clear - I don't have the slightest idea what he's saying. It's almost like random words. But HE knows what he's trying to say, so I need to pay close attention, because I might just figure it out. I do, too, most of the time.

Anyway, he snapped back, and after he ate, he wanted to take a lil' nap, so that's what he did.

I can't wait for the doctor's visit on Monday. We have so much to discuss, she and I.

And the biggest subject of discussion will be, "What now?" Where do we go from here? We have to go SOMEWHERE...the question is just, where.

And ibake - my heart is with you. I really do know how hard it is to lose your mom. I lost mine in 04, and my daughter in 95, and with both of them, it seems like 2 weeks ago. It is so hard. You are in my prayers, ibake. Really. I don't know what I would do without you, and the other wonderful people on this site.

...lil' deb