My father lives overseas and recently came to the US to visit. His recent stay with my family has been, unpleasant, to say the least. It's also compounded by my mother who has undiagnosed BPD who also came, but that's another story.
Anyway, for a few years now, he's had incontinence and refuses to accept this. During his stay, his denims were almost always wet and smelled like urine. He sleeps with them too! Everywhere he goes, he smells like urine. Especially when he's in the car, the smell gets stronger and lingers for a while.
I've been telling him nicely to either go to the doctor or get adult diapers, but he refuses! He just is silent and doesn't say anything. I know it's hard to accept and is embarrassing to have to wear adult diapers, but isn't it more embarrassing to walk around with wet pants and getting them all over (cars, furniture, etc.)?
One thing I've noticed too is when he makes decisions now, it's been pretty extreme. For example, he waiting for me at the airport and didn't bring a thick enough jacket. So he immediately complained, "I'm cold! I'm going back home now!"
When I got called in to work one day, I was not able to pick him up at the hotel early, so he complained again, "I'm bored! I'm going back home now!"
When the hotel messed up his reservation, "I have nowhere to stay now! I'm going back home!"
Why can't the solution to whatever problem he's facing now be more reasonable and actionable? It's not like he can change his flights because first of all, they were non-refundable.
So if he's cold, why can't he just go back inside the airport or think about getting a thicker jacket? If he's bored, find something to entertain himself with? And I'm sure there's a more reasonable solution if the hotel messes up your reservation that's not flying back thousands of miles away.
What goes on in the senior person's brain that make them so illogical?
I suggest you read this 33 page booklet which has the best information ever about managing dementia and what to expect with an elder who's been diagnosed with it.
Understanding the Dementia Experience, by Jennifer Ghent-Fuller
https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/210580
Jennifer is a nurse who worked for many years as an educator and counsellor for people with dementia and their families, as well as others in caring roles. She addresses the emotional and grief issues in the contexts in which they arise for families living with dementia. The reviews for her books are phenomenal b/c they are written in plain English & very easy to read/understand. Her writings have been VERY helpful for me.
The full copy of her book is available here:
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Best of luck.
And please don't call adult diapers "diapers" in front of your father. You can just call them his new underwear. People despite their mental capacity still deserve to keep their pride in tact, so calling them his new underwear sounds so much better than diapers don't you think? The Depends brand look just like underwear.
When my husband was severely incontinent due to his vascular dementia, I had to just get rid of all of his old underwear and replace them with his "new underwear" Depends. That way he didn't have a choice but to wear them.
Your mother may be in denial about her husbands mental decline since she has her own issues but someone needs to have your father evaluated for his mental decline.
The fact that your mother doesn't smell the awful smell of urine or choose to do anything about it, makes me wonder if she too might be suffering from some mental decline, because letting someone walk around with pee filled pants, that gets on furniture and in cars just isn't normal.
Sounds like both your parents need a lot of help. I'm sorry.
The more you degrade him, the more he will resist anything you say.
Go buy him some briefs and offer to do his laundry. This is a humiliating loss for seniors, try to be kind in helping him get a solution.
My dad was put on meds for his prostrate and his incontinence cleared up, your dad needs to see a doctor and tell them what is happening. My dad denied he had a problem and I had to tell the doctors that he was having problems.
I am sorry that you had an unpleasant experience during his visit.