Mom has recently come to live with us due to losing her home. She lived in Florida but lost her home and is now with us in Georgia. Her home was foreclosed on, she remembers bits and pieces, not all at the same time sadly. When she talked about going home we would explain she had no home to go to etc. which of course just upset her more. Of course I thought that was the right thing to do. Two days after we brought her here she decided to walk home to Florida. The only way to stop her was to call the police. After a heartbreaking and incredibly frustrating day at the police station talking to officers and crisis people they called in, she was sent to the er in the expectation she would be admitted for evaluation. The er Dr. released her after talking to her about 20 seconds. The woman that day was not my mother, I was appalled and embarrassed at the way she acted, the things she said the way she treated everyone. It was horrible.
Since then I have talked to some amazing people at Alz. org. who have helped so much. We have changed what we say to her and so far she has been calmer. No more episodes. She does still talk about going home every day, either us driving her or taking a bus. She tries to call my younger sister ( the reason she lost her home) forgetting that her cell phone doesn't work, but tries calling over and over again. She forgets we have a home phone too. So far we have been able to divert answering and by morning she seems to forget, at least at first. She is getting more and more persistent about going home but I know that if we explain why she's with us again she'll go into another 'episode'. I cant get her into see a Dr because she refuses to go saying she is fine no reason to go. I cant get any Dr.'s here to even TRY and work with me because she doesn't remember who her old Dr. was for me to get her records. I was told by one nurse that my best option was to wait until she did have another episode then have her admitted for evaluation.
She has had one episode of hallucinating, she thought there was a bug on the ceiling and one day packed a little suitcase and waited, saying my sister was going to pick her up.
My husband is usually home with her most of the day and makes sure that she eats. We realized we don't ask if she is hungry because she never is but if we just tell her that it's time to eat she'll eat. Today he found her wandering outside a bit confused. She didn't know what she had gone outside for, he directed her to our pigs ( we have pigs and goats), she had a happy lil visit with them and went inside.
I know I have rambled terribly and this is long, I'm so sorry about that. I work full time and this is about the only time I have to be able to get online very much and am trying to get as much out as I can. :)
Thank you so much for 'listening' and any advice you might have. I had no idea how stressful this would be when she got here but being able to read others stories on her has been helpful beyond measure, Thank you.
My sister did not send much of anything with her, but didn't know who her Dr. was either.
I haven't unpacked everything of hers yet, when I try gets so upset and angry.
The biggest thing with mom about going home I think is my niece, Mom misses her so much. She wants to talk to her and then when she does she gets extremely upset and the whole going home thing is worse. I've considered not letting her talk to her anymore but I hate to do that too.
Thank you!
Going home may not mean the same to your Mother, sometimes they are looking for their childhood home. Just reassure her that once everything at "home" is okay you can see about going back. She probably doesn't remember wanting to go home from one day to the next. Good luck!