Expert: Paula Damgaard - 11/30/2009

Question
My dad is 82, early stages of alzheimers.  In the past couple of months he seems to have completely lost track of time, and he admits this.  He goes to bed at 5:00 pm some nights, then wakes at all hours. I know the change in time with Daylight Savings makes it dark very early, but his change seems extreme.  Very recently he awoke us to get ready for church at 1:30 a.m.  He has large display digital clocks in his bed room so we were surprised at this.  My brother thinks he may have literally lost the ability to tell time, is that a symptom? Thank you!

Answer
Hi Jean, in a simple answer: yes it is.  Why? who knows!  The brain works in so many ways and why some AD people lose the ability to work in the right time zone is unknown.  My mom used to get up 5-6 times a night and start a new day everytime!  

If he is living alone, I suggest it is time to have someone be with him or assisted living.  No telling where he might wind up if he thinks it is time for him to be....  and he walks out the door at 3am to go to ....  He could get so lost and that would be awful.

Remember you can't reason with an unreasonable mind so thinking you will be able to talk him through this won't work.  You must do things now to ensure his safety.  Consider yourselves lucky that he "thought" to wake you up for church and didn't "think" it was time for him to go to work and he just walked out.

Take care!  Paula