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By Ilene..
I am my mothers caregiver. I had lived away from her for thirty 33 years. She is in beginning to mid stage AD; depending on which professional you speak with. She is a people person and so in public she is able to fool some with her social skills. She is very convincing when she answers questions with made up answers that she believes to be true.
[Editor note: My mother is very good at this.]
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Bowel movements or lack of bowel movements are a big issue with Betty. She monitors them (so she thinks) but really she forgets how regular she is and it is basically due to MIRALAX. THIS IS NOT AN ADVERTISEMENT! One cap dissolved in water with her morning pills and voila we have one everyday. When I came to live here 13 months ago my mother was and had been queen of laxative suppository use for decades.After her hospitalization of 6 weeks in May and June she had lost a lot of memory (possibly due to the morphine she was kept on for her pain). I was able to put the laxatives away.
[Editor note: would you be interested in reading how I solved this problem after four years of trying by combining prune juice and singing (music)?]
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The hospitalization was due to a urinary tract infection that played havoc on the body of this 81 year old woman. She had forgotten how to wipe herself after a BM and got into the habit of wiping forward and inspecting the toilet tissue. This caused cross contamination and hence the UTI. She did not have any complaints that I would consider as symptoms (frequent urination or burning with urination). All of a sudden her mentation was way off, she had trouble walking and extreme full body pain. I thought it was her spine which is very arthritic and the doctors sent her for MRI of neck and low back. A few weeks ago she had similar symptoms I immediately took her to the ER and she was treated with antibiotics as an outpatient nipping the infection in the bud.
[Editor note: should I write about how we finally licked incontinence after more than six years of trying?]
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Four days ago she was asking for an enema because she said she was blocked and hadn't had a BM in many days. UNTRUE! It was just one day because I had forgotten the Miralax the day before. But there was no way to convince her that it would come if not today well then tomorrow. She is very paranoid about colon cancer because her mother died at age 50 from it. I just gave her double the amount of MIRALAX and she has been going for 2 days straight.
{Editor note: I have never received an enema or administered one. But, one day I thought I was either going to give my mother an enema, or take her to the ER. Then, I remembered the advice of Dr Chiriboga. What happened next? Something that can best be described as an atomic explosion.]
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She now blames the frequent BMs on the food I fed her last night a cheese, mushroom and bacon omelet that we have once a week and she really likes it. Every time we eat this she raves about how good it is and how you could not get one this tasty in a restaurant. This morning she claims that she hasn't had an omelet in at least 3 months and will not be eating them again. Control over her food consumption is something she holds onto dearly. I can understand the control issue since each day she is losing more and more of it. She is quite aware of what is going on and wants to hold on to every minute of her reality.
[Editor note: I already wrote I'm Hungry I'm Starving. My mother frequently tells me how she is craving something she hasn't had in months even though she had it a few hours ago. This phenomena is easy to understand, once you finally realize why it is happening.]
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Bob DeMarco is the editor of the Alzheimer's Reading Room and an Alzheimer's caregiver. The Alzheimer's Reading Room is the number one website on the Internet for news, advice, and insight into Alzheimer's disease. Bob has written more than 800 articles with more than 18,000 links on the Internet. Bob resides in Delray Beach, FL.
Original content Bob DeMarco, Alzheimer's Reading Room