Your profile says you're caring for someone with dementia, I'm assuming this is your mom.
Sometimes this is just a thing that people with dementia do. It may be a phase that passes in time. Unfortunately, you can't really "re-train" someone with dementia, and even if you ask for a change (like quiet time), they're not likely to remember. Your best options might be to find a work-around like an adult daycare program or a home care worker - something/someone who can be with your mom while you slip away into another room for your quiet time. Again, it is a behaviour that may pass in time.
Would wearing earphones with music shut her talk out without distracting you from your tasks? I like to read with classical music in the background, but I'm sure some people would just find that as distracting as Mom's chatter.
Does she expect you to engage with her when she talks, or in she content to mutter on and on to herself?
RJ- I wonder this about my Mom as well. Not to be disrespectful or ugly about it. She talks constantly. I mean it is very seldom, that she doesn't have something to say. And when she doesn't I know she is tired and ready for bed. Sometimes I think it soothes her, sometimes i think she does it if she feels out of place, sometimes I think it may be shes lonely for my Dad, and sometimes I think she just enjoys talking. I don't know. But, I do know I would sure miss it, if she were gone. So I do my best to be a good listener. And now when I hear her I just smile and thank the Lord for my Mom.
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Sometimes this is just a thing that people with dementia do. It may be a phase that passes in time. Unfortunately, you can't really "re-train" someone with dementia, and even if you ask for a change (like quiet time), they're not likely to remember. Your best options might be to find a work-around like an adult daycare program or a home care worker - something/someone who can be with your mom while you slip away into another room for your quiet time. Again, it is a behaviour that may pass in time.
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Does she expect you to engage with her when she talks, or in she content to mutter on and on to herself?
Sometimes I think it soothes her, sometimes i think she does it if she feels out of place, sometimes I think it may be shes lonely for my Dad, and sometimes I think she just enjoys talking. I don't know.
But, I do know I would sure miss it, if she were gone. So I do my best to be a good listener.
And now when I hear her I just smile and thank the Lord for my Mom.