What is the best way to take a driver's license away from my husband who has Alzheimer?

My Aunt is 83 with moderate Alzheimer's, she lives with us. The hospital told us she couldn't drive anymore, so when she came to live with us I told her it was up to her doctor when she could drive again. He of course said no, but I had to ask him to notify the DMV and they sent a letter telling her that her license was revoked. I made a copy of the letter to give her and she ripped it up. Its been tough, she still says she wants to drive and chooses not to remember that she doesn't have a license. She wont turn in the one on her wallet. We always hide the keys from her. She had a spare key in her walker that she would not give up. So one day she left her purse in the car and we took the key to the store and had them grind extra notches in it. Then I put it back. She still thinks she has a key, and we know it doesn't work. Sometimes you have to get creative.
It feels wrong sometimes, but we have found ways to say things and blame the dr, dmv, etc etc so she is mad at them and not us. Our goal is to keep her safe. And sometimes that means she is NOT happy. Hang in there, it is hard.

All of your answers were good. Right now my husband has actually lost his truck key. We are oing to have a mechanic who works at our dealership tell our daughter how to disable the truck. I think the idea of selling both automobiles and buying myself a new car is the best suggestion of all. Thanks to all of you. I can't say "keep on trucking" because the truck won't be here. (ha). I haven't answered earlier because my computer is acting up. I am using another one that I have to get used to....Thanks to ALL'
!!!!
marymember

the best way is under the hood of the car --discnect some wires.
My sister had her licence taken away ,but she drove anyways.So
if the car can't start -- it will stay right in the driveway.

Most ate sound things to do but if he becomes a physical danger to you do the right thing have him put where he can't hurt you or himself that won't I hope happen at all under proper care

My husband and I are elderly and I knew that I would have the same problem and dreaded it like crazy. He also had a pickup that he loved. I told him one day that we are both not young anymore and if anything happened to him I didn't know what I would do, so I needed to start driving and needed him to remind me of the lights, etc. And I would teach him to use the washer, dryer, etc.(that never happened. But the Lord sent our son at just the right time, after he needed his Dad's truck. My husband never minds letting anybody borrow anything, just won't give anything away. He forgot about the truck and I took the car keys and hid them. What I was dreading so terribly never happened!!
I hope this might help some.

Veronica, interesting comment and it reminded me that one time, before Dad got bad, he (a retired mathematician!) had sat and computed the total cost over a year of owning their two vehicles, and tried to get Mom to agree to sell them because it was actually going to be less expensive to take a taxi or the bus or one of the elderly ride services in their town. When you figure out the insurance, gas, registration and average out the maintenance costs...it IS a lot of money over a year! Mom refused and they never did it. But I've since learned that there are lots of services through the local council on aging that I had no idea existed until my Mom started needing more help.

Veronica, same here, I am trying to plan ahead for myself. Every day that retirement community keeps looking better and better for myself :)

I can't wait for the car that can drive itself... that would save all of us a lot of big time worry and holding our breathe waiting for something bad to happen.

In fact I am ready for such a vehicle because I find driving my parents anywhere is a major panic attack waiting to happen. Dad doesn't understand that... his comment to me is usually "but who is going to drive us?" Gee, Dad, I don't know, in fact who is going to drive ME since I have no children?

If it is any consolation to anyone hubby and I have had many conversations about how we will manage when we can no longer drive. We had thought of moving into town but if we could not dive we certainly could not walk to the store etc. So it will be dial a bus, taxis and friends when the time comes. We already do a lot of mail order because we can't face the malls anymore. I don't like driving in traffic especially somewhere new but hubby absolutely panics with out his GPS. We are both in our mid 70s so I don't think there will be any force involved when our time comes

It has been my experience that little white lies are sometimes a good alternative. When you take him to get tested, remove the truck while you are gone. When he asks, tell him he told you to get rid of it when he didn't pass the test because he didn't want to chance hurting anyone...that's the kind of man he is and praise him for the decision. This seems juvenile but it does work. Especially when he gets mad, you can tell him it was his choice. This is such a difficult time for many of us and, along with lovingly doing what's best for our aging and ill loved ones, it is imperative to keep those around us save and ourselves sane and safe. And get therapy to get rid of guilt and help grieve the loss you are facing every single day.

My Dad voluntarily announced he was no longer driving after his last little fender bender. He also had gone into insurance company and taken out a $1 million liability policy when his dementia was first diagnosed, to protect other people....so he was responsible. He is in mem. care too....and still tells stories about driving....and traveling somewhere to go to work or earn money. My Mom, on the other hand, is like the problem being discussed here. No WAY is she giving up driving or anything else. We are in that timeframe of making that decision. I've mentioned it to the doctor, and right now, we have caregivers 6 hrs a day, and they drive her. Doc has told her she should not be driving and should let the caregivers drive, but she sneaks out on her own after they leave. She really has limited herself to about a 5 mile limit of home, and to places she goes to all the time...the bank, the grocery and to visit my Dad, basically. BUT, even with that $1M liability policy in place....it's time for her to stop! We do have an attorney who always promises to 'be the bad guy' when she refuses to listen, so we may be going there. First, we're working on an AL placement or moving her and Dad together with family. That would solve the driving issue. She only has about 5 months of money left, to stay at home anyhow. I do know, with my Dad...because of the memory loss, many things, like hiding the keys....or his guns....were dealt with by simply saying he must have lost them or misplaced the item. And soon, he forgot he was even looking for anything. So one suggestion is to have them 'get lost'. Or, others have had luck with ' we took the truck in for repair and it's not done yet'. They cannot track time, so don't remember how long it's been 'in the shop'. Of course, that's only once they've progressed to a certain point of really losing memory. On other things my parents don't or didn't want to do, I had good luck saying 'We're going to do .....whatever.....for 30 days, and if you still don't like it, we'll change it back." By the time 30 days are up, they've forgotten it hasn't always been that way. Arguing, or letting things get to violence is not the answer. In this case, I would just say the agency took away the license...not your fault and nothing can be done, unless he wants to go to them or a lawyer and complain. If he does that, everyone will see that he has the problem and they will still tell him NO.

Count yourself extremely lucky if just taking him to that appointment is all you have to do to get his license revoked. After several tickets, several episodes of Dad's getting lost, 4 times ending up in ditches and snow banks, and thousands of heated arguments, I decided to get help to stop his driving. I took me from December to June, with half a dozen phone calls to the BMV and the police, letters from me to the doctor and the BMV, a letter from the doctor to the BMV, and then a form from BMV to Dad for the doctor to fill out and mail in (again) followed by two notices from the BMV to Dad telling him to get tested. Dad finally taking and failing the written test, at which time they kept the license, but that didn't stop him from driving. I took two sets of keys away, but he had 4 more sets hidden throughout the house. We did all the usual tricks: dead battery, flat tires, etc, but he knew how to call the automotive place who came to fix it all. Then he drove for two months without the license, even though we (and the neighbors) reported it to the police. They would not stop him based on a call, only if he's not driving safely and they see it. It finally ended with him driving through the closed garage door. Obliterated the door, but the car was fine. We then lied and told him the car engine was damaged inside, and could not be fixed. Pretended to have it towed away, and had to store it in storage facility for months until we could get him to agree to sell. (Lawyer and police said we were no allowed to sell without his agreement.. Technically we were not even allowed to just take the car away like we did. ....And that was only the beginning of his raging about how "they stole" his car. His anger and self pitying remarks, heard by the folks at the senior center (ex: I might as well shoot myself as not have my car.") got him taken off for a week in the psyche ward of the hospital, as they are obligated to report any suicidal talk. He mind deteriorated dreadfully in there, and has been going down hill ever since. ............All I can say is good luck.

Windyridge, we are just thankful that he did not kill someone. I guess it is hard not to sound bitter, but we are all going through the meatgrinder.

Looking back, I am angry with myself for not throwing MY OWN hissy fit to get him to stop driving when he drove into the local bank. We were the laughing stock of the region when he continued to drive, wear filthy clothing in public, say inappropriate things to good friends, obsess about people he now decided to hate, etc. He was the "doer" but also the "victim" when the family closeby stepped in to "help".

Showtime, it's hard not to get mad but it's the dementia. Maybe your dad was always a suborn jerk ,I don't know, but he can't reason any longer. My dad is 85, still driving and if anyone suggests that his memory or abilities are not what they used to be he has a fit. So we don't argue, correct or point out his mistakes, we just divert, bob and weave and move on. I track his driving each day with a secret gps and the minute I see him wandering or going to places out of his immediate orbit his driving days are over. I know this is risky but like someone else said, I'll have to physically fight him to get the keys and then throughly disable it.

Oh yes, when my father's tried and true Eye Doctor told him his macular degeneration was too advanced and he needed to stop driving immediately, he got mad and went to 7, count them 7, other opthamologists answer shopping for one that would write a letter to the DMV. If any of these people would have done so, I would have written to the state licensure board in a heart beat.

What is it about this generation? They are the first to tell their family no, but they cannot take NO for an answer themselves.

My father drove a large pickup through a bank and into an office where a pregnant loan officer (who also was a family friend) did business. By the grace of God, this wonderful young woman was at a prenatal office visit. If she and her then unborn son would have been killed by this stubborn old narcissist fool, many lives would have been ruined.

It took FIVE more years and the help of the sheriffs office to get his selfish self off of the road.

Make that appointment TODAY. You may save several innocent people's lives.

I had the same problem. Finally my husband was lost for 36 hours, went across 3 States and was found in a parking lot 5 hours from home at 9pm, by the police. After being released form the hospital for dehydration, I got him to agree to give up driving. Of course, he forgot about being lost and promising to stop driving.
I told him I would be his chauffeur, and because I don't like to drive a truck we need to trade it in and get a car that I can drive. He agreed and like lightening we went to the dealership and did it.
Yes, he fussed for about a year, but slowly accepted it and only mentions it in passing. I think there is such a strong connection with men and their trucks, that you have to remove the vehicle if you want them to stop. He was a good driver,
just couldn't remember where to go. He didn't even drive that much, but couldn't trust him not to get in the truck and go...... He doesn't know how to use a cell phone, so when he left we lost communication with him. I even put a tracker on his truck, but that only leads the police to him after hie is lost and they have to go get him, which isn't really solving the problem.
I got the idea from my mother, who told my father that the new car was her's to drive, and he couldn't . You will have to be creative.

What can I say in our defense? Not much. We were never able to get his keys, and all discussions would end in terrible arguments. No one was ever right except him. We would have had to wrestle our 91 YO dementia-ridden paranoid dad to the ground to get his keys out of his pocket. (He never showered so we couldn't steal them while he was in the shower!) He failed the vision part of his DL test, but insisted that they had it in for him, and it was a conspiracy to keep old guys from driving...and he insisted his driving was fine! So first my brother tried flattening a tire. When Dad saw that, he threatened to harm anyone he caught conspiring against him. Then we let the battery die, and that was the trick. When he thought about driving, and found the car dead, he would ask us to take him for a new battery. We said, sure, Dad, but I'm too busy this week. We'll go next week, and since his dementia was terrible, we could do that every time he asked. We always warned him he had no license, and that we didn't think he was one to break the law, but he was determined to drive anyway. There are tricks one can use to disable the engine, but Dad was a mechanic who could have fixed anything we did. He died in November, after breaking a hip. We are all at peace now.

We went through this with my dad. Diagnosed with dementia his driving was worsening due to reasoning skills. When he hit my sons car in our driveway and walked away not even realizing it was time to take the license. I notified his primary doctor who brought him in and then told him he was sending notice to DMV that he was medically unable to drive any longer. This didn't register with my dad and when the paperwork from state came asking him to surrender his license he was livid. Over and over again I had to tell him why he could no longer drive. Finally while he was in the hospital briefly we removed his car from the premises and stored it off site. Eventually we sold the car. Today in memory car my dad still asks about his car and even sometimes tells me the places he's been driving lately. Dementia is terrible but what a relief to keep others safe and my dad safe too.

I you can get your Dr. to be the bad guy, go for it. Husband's doctor threw me under the bus and did not address the situation. The only thing she mentioned was him taking a driving test, however, I've read that sometimes the demented person will pass the test and then what. I finally took the keys and I don't think I'll ever hear the end to it.

No, an expired license will not work. You need to get a photo ID, from the driver's license place. If you even want to take a plane, valid ID is required. I take my 96 yr old mom to casino occassionally and you need a valid ID there if you want to use any of the perks! If you can get the id before the license expires it is easier, at least here in florida. an expired id was not a valid id and had to provide all sorts of other documents to get the id, a real pain. she thinks the id is a license-it looks similar.
my brother came over to my mom's while I was there and she was asleep and we shuttled her car to his house. I took it on 1 last road trip with her and then sold it.

It is hard. My mom kept saying how she needs to renew her license this coming October. I just flat out told her she couldn't. That the DMV would take one look at her and say no. She looked sad and sad I suppose so and we haven't talked about it since. My hope is October will come and go and she won't remember to renew anyway. But f she does remember the only way she can get there is if I take her and I just won't. It's hard.

I was wondering though, what do they use for a photo ID if they don't have a current license? Can they use the expired one?

you have to consider the potential horrible consequences first and foremost~your husband may be a terror initially, but I would think (hope) eventually he'd get over it.

Several years ago, my mom confused the gas & break pedal so while she was trying to stop she was actually accelerating~ right across the street and into her neighbors car-port;totalling her car and neighbors. I immediately notified her doctor ~ to this day she doesn't know this~ and he instigated the whole thing with the DMV. Mom passed the written and verbal but failed the driving portion, like within five minutes. When the DMV took my mom's license away, she fell into a bit of a funk. She kept on insisting that the instructor was out to get her and 'threatened' to take her test at another DMV. I just said, 'good luck' practicing because I wasn't about to enable her in any way shape or form. Anyway, my point being, you don't want to wait cause the consequences can be horrific~ which I reminded my mom (for like a year after!)

Whatever you do, please make sure that he does not drive. I have my beloved daughter and her kids out there. They mean the world to me and if they died I would not have any family left in the world. Whether it is the doctor, the DMV, or whoever, just do it, take away the ability to drive.

Mary, if your husband has an out of control temper and is potentially violent, why is he still living at home? I agree with the other comments that say to allow the doctors to take the license away, but if he will then turn around and attack you - especially physically - for doing so, you gave a bigger problem than him driving. As for what to do with the truck, is it possible that you could park it somewhere other than your home? That way you would have access to it, but it would not be a constant source of temptation and frustration for your husband.

When we had to take my Dad's keys away due to advancing dementia, his doctor agreed to be the bad guy. He said he was taking them for six months, after which if Dad wanted them back he would have to go to a facility the state runs where he would be tested on a simulator, then take a written test then a road test. If he passed all three, the doc would give him the keys back. By the time six months had passed, Dad was pretty resigned to not driving. When his license expired and we had to take him to get a State ID, he went back to insisting he needed a license and wanted the car keys. I told him I'd take him to the DMV, but he would have to convince THEM he was able to drive. Did not happen.

Yes out of harms way, thanks for asking. It will take years to restore what was ruined. Thanks for the advice

twopupsmom, I like your name. We have 3 little doggies and I love them dearly. If you don't want your husband to have a driver's license, see about getting him a state issued picture ID. Here in Texas, they look just like a DL, you get it at the same place. It never expires, but it says Identification Card on it. I see you're in Baltimore, I hope y'all were safe.

My husband drives me crazy every day with the where's my car, I want it right now. But I took the keys away four years ago, told him every day, repair man was coming out to fix his car ( brand new) every day, having the car proved way too much of a headache so I sold the car. Telling him it needed more work. Well his liscence expired and he wanted it renewed now! Took him for renewal, knowing he couldn't even tell them his address, guess what, they renewed it for six years. There's no way to stop your husband from wanting the truck & keys, just take them, the wrath will be tremendous but just use the re directing technique. He will blame you and hate you, but it will come & go. I also sold my car and bought one that takes no keys to open or operate, he has no clue how it works. Good luck it's very hard taking their independence away but the alternative is not pretty. After 4 years he brings it up, demandingly, 3-4 times a day, ignoring the question helps sometime. I would not take him for that test.

I still struggle with my Dad [93] and him wanting to go back to driving but he is physically unable to get back behind the wheel. How he hates this lack of independence as he is still in clear mind but his reaction time is now very poor. He stopped driving six years ago. Yikes, I've seen Dad with a grocery cart in the store, I don't want that man back on the road driving!!

Then Dad said he will have my Mom drive him.... hello, Mom is 97 and she is legally blind due to macular degeneration... he said he can still see and he can direct her where to drive. Believe me, Mom would never do that in a million years so I know Dad is just blowing smoke. But it still burns me when he talks like that.

Any time Dad tries to guilt me into driving him somewhere he will threaten to drive himself.... what I do now is tell him he needs to contact his car insurance carrier and tell them that he will now be the main driver, and not me. And that his auto insurance rate will probably double if not more. That usually shuts him down.

My parents still need to have their car because my Mom can't physically climb up into my Jeep so I need to drive their car when I take her to appointments.

I worry about this as well. I have had so many near misses with my dad that I refuse to ride in the car with him and I told him so but he always blames the near misses on something that's not his fault even when his giant feet can't reach the brake pedal. I have talked to him about quitting driving and he says he is fine and I worry about him driving. he wants to drive himself from Arizona to Oregon and usually one of us in the family flies there and drive here with him but nobody can go this time and he insists he can do it himself. He can see a little better now that he has had cataract surgery but physically he is not very strong so the reflexes are naturally slower. I feel so guilty that I can't go but my sister says not to but what if he injures or kill someone? I am NOT even worried if he injures himself because I think he is of sound mind and being stubborn about driving I just worry if he hurts another person. depending what state you are in I think you can him pulled over possibly and have his license taken away right there. Good luck to you you are doing the right thing

If you talk to your Dads primary care physician and explain why you think he should not be driving they might agree to make a report to the RMV. They will call your Dad in to be tested. This is what happened with my Mom and she failed the test. They took Dads licence away when he was in rehab, without testing at the RMV. I'm not sure how that worked but I'm glad they did it.
Good luck.