Sometimes she hears people whispering and other times she thinks there's two men on a ladder trying to get in through her window. What can we do? I live with her and I always check to try to comfort her but she still seems upset and then can't sleep. Thank you in advance for any suggestions.
Unfortunately, when someone has dementia, the things they think they are hearing, feeling or experiencing seem very, very real to them. Sometimes it's impossible for them to rationalize something they see or hear, so they make up a huge, long story in their mind to justify it.
My grandmother was extremely demented in her later years and used to tell us someone was breaking into the attic through a window she had nailed shut, coming downstairs through several locked doors, getting meat out of the locked freezer, cooking it, eating it, washing the dishes and putting them away where she couldn't find them. All of this was to justify the fact that she had misplaced her favorite skillet.
I would recommend talking with your mom's doctor and seeing if a geriatric psych evaluation can be done to determine what's going on, and have her tested for any possible infections (like a UTI) to rule out any possibility of infection causing the change of mindset.
They didn't but I didn't know my mom was having hearing issues.
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