What to do when they want to go home.

One issue that caregivers often have to deal with is when their loved one with dementia insists that they want to go home. This can happen when they are living in a nursing home, memory care unit or some other residential care setting. It can also happen when they are living in their child’s home or even if they are still living in the house they have lived in for the last forty years.

It can be very distressing for the caregiver because it is practically impossible to convince someone that this is their home. They simply won’t believe you because they have lost the ability to recognize where they are.

Often people with Alzheimer’s or some other form of dementia who want to go home are trying to get back to a time when they were younger and felt safe. Home is not so much a place as a state of mind. It can be their childhood home with their parents and siblings or an earlier marriage. It’s a time and place long gone.

So, what do you do? Here are a few things you can try:

For some people, putting them in the car and driving around for about 10 or 15 minutes can do the trick. They feel they are home when you drive them back to the door again.

Another response is to say something like – “Yes, we’ll go in a while but I have to do the dishes first.” Then while you look like you are busy doing something you change the subject and start talking about other things. This is often enough to get it out of their head.

Another one to try is to say: ” Yes, we’ll go in a while. What are you going to do when you get there?”

Then you can follow on with more questions: “Which room are you going to go into first?”

“Is that the one with the blue carpet?”

“Will anyone else be there?”

And on and on. This will help you to know where they think they want to go and who they want to see. Then you talk about that place and those people. While all this is happening you can offer them a drink or something to eat. It is all a way of settling people down and making them feel safe.

Soon – In a while – Later on – are all words I used with my mother. You never say “No, we can’t go. You are already at home.”

By trying to convince them that they are already at home you will just make them feel like they are trapped in this strange place. You have to learn to go with them on their journey. To them, this is reality. What you know does not matter. Their world is different and you need to learn how to live in it with them.

This is why caring for someone with Alzheimer’s or another form of dementia is so difficult and so exhausting.