How can we help my mom (ALZ) get over the death of Dad 3 weeks ago. Lives in a nursing home and con

I am really sorry that you lost your Dad.

I think for your Mom with Alzheimer's, you really cannot tell her the truth as she will forget it. You can distract her or just says he is in heaven without talking about death cruelly. Sometimes we told my FIL that his wife was not here in the house. One time he was able to see her urn near the flower pots and realized she was not here and said he was crazy!

Depends on the staging of your Mom, you can explain to her in a nice way or just need to tell her he is not there and ask her what she needs. Distracting her with some activities or some other issues.

The nursing home administrator told me they told white lies so the patients are not upset. Just say he is not here and etc.

Hope this helps.

Nina

Hi, Jeri,

First of all, let me express my sorrow about your loss. I can only imagine how difficult your dad's death is for you.

As to your question, Nina's right. Although it will be tempting to keep telling your mom that her husband died, it's better to gloss over that with a white lie. As difficult as that is, you risk a traumatic outburst by bringing the death up; also, because of the loss of short-term memory, you risk having these outbursts recur since she'll keep bringing up "Where's Dad?" Although we didn't experience a similar loss when Mom was still alive and suffering from Alzheimer's, my mom did ask periodically about her parents (obviously, long deceased). I would tell her that I haven't seen them in awhile, and then move the topic to something that was easier to discuss. I came to the decision that it wasn't worth the emotional distress that I would continually cause by telling her that her parents (which she just claimed to have "seen") had died.

Again, I am so sorry about your family's loss. Take care and keep us posted!

Dorian