It is a beautiful day out today. My mother (86 yo) and I went to the doctor after she had been watching TV all day. When we got home, I said it would be a great day to go outside and visit. She tried to turn on the TV, instead. The remote control was messed up, so it wouldn't come on. She has lost the ability to handle it, so she called me. I told her no, I wasn't going to turn the TV on when she needed to go out for a while. She got really angry at me, but I just went for a walk without straightening the TV out.
My mother is still able to walk and talk to people, but she is pulling inside herself more. This puts a lot on me, because she dwells more on herself and relies on me totally for companionship. I need help with this, because being with her means just listening to her symptoms for as long as I can tolerate it. She talks about other things with friends. With me she talks symptoms, like she wants me to fix them.
Does there come a time when we just let them watch TV if they want? or is this enabling them to not make social contacts. To me, it would have been easier to just turn on the TV, but I didn't think it was best for her.
Memories of the hundreds of times my mother told me to turn off the tv and to go outside and play.
The circle of life, right?
One thing I thought about recently is that the TV was always on when I was younger. I was in and out of the house during the day, so I don't know what she was doing. But at nighttime she was in front of the TV. She watched sports all weekend. The TV is more interesting than real life and is a lot safer, I guess. She is still the same person, I guess, and she won't change from it. So I do all the things that need to be done and leave her with her TV. It would drive me crazy to join her, so I don't. There are so many other things that need to be done.
I KNOW he severely depressed. He refuses to treat it. He is retiring soon and plans to do nothing but sleep.
I live my life and he lives his. I hate it, but it's never going to change. He stopped caring/listening to me years ago.
Someone has to WANT to change or they won't. Simple as that.
Coy had Lewy Body Dementia. When it first became apparent the symptoms were extremely severe. His attention span was about 2 minutes max, he was fidgety, couldn't focus on anything. Tried to read the newspaper upside down. But then he gradually became better and after a few months settled in the "mild" stage of his disease.
It was awesome to have him able to focus again! Complicated drama with commercial breaks was too frustrating for him, but I bought a few videos of shows he used to like. Hogan's Heroes was wonderful -- under a half an hour, simple and predictable characters, and plots he had seen more than once before. There were several others. Also he loved travel videos or nature ones. About the only thing he watched on television was sports. I worked from home and I could not stand the loud television so I insisted on wireless earphones for him. At first he resisted but then he discovered he could still hear the game while he went to the bathroom and after that he was OK with them.
So while there are many posts on AC about how to get a loved one to not watch so much tv, I spent a lot of effort on making sure that watching television was pleasant entertainment for my loved one.
Coy did other activities as well. Television did not consume all his waking hours. But he enjoyed the time he spent on it.
The nurses at the home where we had him for respite care twice, stated the same the really tried getting him to come listen to music, etc in the main entertainment area, but he refused.
This, is by far the hardest job. I could raise 20 kids, verses one parent with alzheimers disease, seriously. As crazy as that sounds.
"Blessings to all of you & big hugs"!
And I listened to all that crap with a straight face. No point in trying to inject how the rest of us handle the air that we breathe.
The only thing that matters is their reality. Their teeny-tiny reality.
When my husband was first diagnosed, and before he got on drugs and probably before the inflamation in his brain went away, he could not watch television. His attention span was too short, the commercials interrupted the flow of the story line, and the whole experience was just too confusing for him. We were very thankful to come up with some CDs of familiar old television shows. Without the commercials and with familiar material that could entertain him for an hour or so now and then. We were grateful! Then he got back enough cognition to watch sports on tv and also liked history and nature shows. Toward the end he once again did not watch television -- he had no interest.
So whether watching television is a good thing or a bad thing I guess depends on where you are coming from.
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