Why is my elderly father waking up at night with extreme anxiety and confusion?

Jill, a lot of on here have had great success with having our parents with dementia evaluated by a geriatric Psychiatrist. Sometimes, it's not as simple as an antianxiety med in dementia. There are antidepressants with antianxiety properties that often seem to work well on those nameless fears and worries.

This message is actually addressed to Dontask4handout. I found your posting not only to be unhelpful to jilzz101, but also entirely inappropriate. This is a forum where we can help each-other with the various physical and psychological trials of dealing with age, it is not a pulpit for you to pontificate about Christianity. There are people of all faiths who post here and we try to treat each-other the same as any other person, regardless of faith. There was absolutely nothing in jilzz101's post that indicated that her father was having a crisis of faith or that a fear of eternal hellfire was what was behind his behavior. What if jilzz101 is Jewish? Or Buddhist? Or has no religious affiliation at all? Is it really helpful, then, to poke her with your holier-than-thou, only Christians go to heaven kind of theology? She came here looking for emotional support, not to hear about hellfire and damnation if her father hasn't been "saved." I am not anti-Christian or any religion, but I do dislike the idea of using a forum that is supposed to be about sharing our experiences with caring for our elderly loved ones to proselytize and scare posters about the fury of a wrathful God should our parent not be a Christian. You probably meant well and were hoping to "save" her father, but it was inappropriate.

Believe it or not, I had an elderly friend in his 90s who showed very similar behavior toward the end of his life. He had spoken of wanting to go home and even started talking about his deceased wife and even talking in his sleep as though he were talking to her from a distance sometimes, even calling out to her in his sleep. I knew deep down he must be in the dying process just because of how he was behaving at times. He had macular degeneration and even started saying it was "getting darker", which was why he said he always left all the lights on 24 seven. I just knew deep down he must be in the dying process and sure enough not long after we met he ended up having to be put into a facility and then he died at a medical center near the facility. 

Did it ever occur to you that even though he wants to go home he may actually be very worried about meeting his maker and being judged? This would be the right time to get right with his maker before it's too late and he can do this by accepting Jesus as his Savior so that way he has no worries. Have you ever wondered why people are so nervous toward the end? That's why, people are nervous because they're not right with their maker, and we will all stand before him one day and give an account for our lives and what we've done with our lives. What will really matter besides having Jesus as our savior is how much did we love one another, especially the least come on us. The poor are always with us, did we help the less fortunate or did we just pass them by? These will all be  counted against us if there's anything not right and we will lose rewards and miss out on them forever if we didn't earn those rewards. How much we love each other is more than just words, it's in our actions because actions speak louder than words simply because actions reflect what's really in our hearts. Yes, an awful lot of people are very anxious when they're nearing the end because they know deep down they're not right with their maker. Hate me if you want, I'm just simply speaking the truth and I won't back down because I know why people are afraid to die toward the end, I know why people are anxious, I saw it happen at least once

I agree with BarbBrooklyn...seek out a psychiatrist who deals with the geriatric population - someone who has experience prescribing medications from a broad standpoint, rather than a well-meaning GP simply looking at a symptom and trying to match it to whatever prescription med they throw a dart at. I am not sure I'd be worried about mobility affects, if he were given an elephant tranquilizer, of course, but most of the meds a skilled doctor will prescribe shouldn't lead to that. It's not easy to always find the specialists you will want to work with - sometimes it's like a needle in a haystack, but they're out there.

Be careful giving Tylenol PM to an elder because it has been known to create horrendous problems with delusions & hallucinations & can be deadly to older people. There was a very informative write up recently in the Health section of the Washington Post newspaper in which a woman gave that to her mother and had to be sent to the ER as a result. The ER doctor was shocked that someone would do that to their parent, but she claimed she didn't know. I myself just learned of certain medicines that we take on a common basis like Benadryl and Tylenol PM that are toxic to older people who are so vulnerable.

I finally had to put my DH on Zoloft 50mg - and there have been no side-effects to date other than he is no longer worried all the time. He is 95 so I hear where you're coming from. I held off for a full year after it was recommended by his prime physician because I was worried about what it might do to his kidneys and liver.

I have no regrets having finally put him on it - I have days where I'm tempted to join him. For myself I looked to supplements instead of medication. The supplements didn't work for him.

Look up sundowners syndrome. I hate to say this, but you'd need to hire a CNA to watch him at night or put him to nursing home. You could try giving him Tylenol PM.

My husband's doctor has given him medications which do render him pretty much immobile throughout the night but wear off by morning. Since I'm always with him at night, this is not a problem.

... There are a few anti anxiety meds you can discuss with his physician (a phychyatrist is not needed to prescribe, his general physician can) ... Saraquil and larazapam are two others that in lower doses create a steady calming, a leveling of mood if you will by knocking off the edge of anxiety but does not create a foggy mind nor immobility or balance issues. Work closely with his doc to find out and then manage the dosage that works for your grandfather. My mother is on a daily small dose of saraquil, and then larazapam is a secondary med used as needed if her anxiety still peeks.

My mother's psychiatric evaluations did not involve hours and hours of sessions. In each case, we are talking about a doctor having a 15 or 20 minute conversation with her.

Geriatric psychiatrists specialize in medication management of the elderly. I think that you are the thinking perhaps of neurocognitive evaluations, which involve several hours of paper and pencil testing.

No amount of "paying attention to" my mother did anything to help her anxiety. Meds did.