ALZHEIMER'S BLOG:

I get Alzheimer's Weekly Newsletter every Sunday. http://www.alzheimersweekly.com/ This week they have an article on Money management and dementia and when is it time to take the checkbook away.

I can go back to taking care of my father in law. He always carried money on him, and when we got his check we would let him have $300.00 to carry in his wallet like he was use to and put the rest in the bank for him. One day he actually lost his wallet and all the money. We already experienced him with his memory loss and I was just trying to keep him as close to normal as possible. Dad was so upset over the money and demanded we give it back to him.

We had to use some imagination and get creative and try to figure out how to keep him happy with out him losing all his money. It took some time but we actually found play money that looked almost like the real thing. Than we would show him his check and have him with us as we deposited it in the bank. We had an envelope from the bank already on us and after putting in his check we gave him the envelope with the fake money.

You may think this was a sneaky thing to do but this ended up being a win - win situation. He was happy to have money on him and we were able to keep him from losing his money.

At the daycare he went to, I found out that he was passing out his fake money to people for little things they did for him.

Check out this article on Alzheimer's Weekly On Line Magazine
http://alzheimersweekly.com/content/money-management-and-dementia .

Sincerely,
Marie Fostino
Alzheimer's A Caretakers Journal
Seaboard Press An Imprint of James A Rock Pub., Co.
www.mariefostino.com
www.mariefostino.blogspot.com