People with Alzheimer’s Can Say the Darndest Things!

By: Marie Marley, PhD
Volunteer – Kansas City Hospice & Palliative Care

Alzheimer’s disease is a serious illness and deservedly so. But sometimes laughter can be good medicine. My experience is that people with Alzheimer’s can say some pretty amusing things. Many times, the person is aware and even proud they said something humorous. Then we laugh with the person – not at them. 

These moments can be among the most precious we’ll ever have with our loved ones. Here are some examples:

My first stories are about one of the ladies with Alzheimer’s I used to volunteer to visit in a local memory care facility. (I’ll call her Ruth.) Ruth told me the same story every time I visited her, except she sometimes included new information or added a twist to some part of the story.

She told me that during World War II the Army used to bus young ladies overseas to a base on Friday nights to dance with the soldiers. Ruth was one of those girls. She was a great dancer, unlike many of the men.

She told me most of them couldn’t dance and they just “stomped out a two-step.” When she told me that she imitated them in a most humorous way, lively stomping her feet up and down.

In addition, Ruth told me that when the girls arrived at the base the men looked them up and down “like they were shopping!” 

One of the bits of information she added once was that her husband was an especially bad dancer. “So bad,” she said, “he must have learned how to dance in a barn!”

When I left Ruth after my visits, I always said, “See you later, alligator.” She would always answer, “Afterwhile crocodile.” But one day she got mixed up, and after I said, “See you later, alligator,” she answered, “Elevator.” Then she realized what she’d said, and we both laughed so hard tears were rolling down our cheeks.

But the most amusing event by far was when she offered me a cookie one day. I patted my ample tummy and asked, “Do I look like I need a cookie?” She said, “Oh, you’re just settling!”

Here’s another example – about the grandfather of one of my friends. (We’ll call him George.) It seems George was having a lot of trouble driving because of his advancing Alzheimer’s. He was adamant that he’d never stop driving, and so his granddaughter, Sandra, had his car disabled. 

Sandra had assumed he’d still be alert enough to call a mechanic to come and repair it, so she called his mechanic to ask him to give George some excuse for not being able to fix the car. When George contacted the mechanic the next day he was told, “Your car needs some parts that are only available on the internet. It will take a long time.”

George then called his granddaughter and said, “Sandra, I have a job for you. Drive me to the internet!” 

And still more examples. These are from my Romanian soulmate, Ed. I took him a little stuffed chick one day. He loved it so much, so I asked him if he would like a rabbit too. He said, “Oh, yes. I would love a rabbit. He would be a companion for the little chick.”

Every day after Ed ate, he put his spoon in his pocket and took it down to his room. One day when I was eating with him, he started to put his spoon in his pocket. I said, “No, Ed. Don’t take that spoon. It doesn’t belong to you. He announced, “Oh no, I take them every day with no remorse!”

Ed had always had a poor appetite and that continued when he had Alzheimer’s and was living in a memory care facility. One day an aide was trying to get him to eat some pudding. He repeatedly refused, then looked at her with a big grin on his face and said: “I’ll eat it if you eat it!”

Another time when an aide was trying in vain to get Ed to eat, she told him, “Marie is concerned you aren’t eating enough. He then announced, “If Marie is concerned that I’m not eating enough, you tell her to come here herself and tell me that!”

Then there was a lady I visited named Marge. She was a devout Catholic who regularly went to mass and who said the rosary three times a day as best she could. She was one of the most holy and well-behaved patients I ever visited. Then one day the head nurse decided Marge needed to use a walker, and she put a sign on it that said, “Marge must use walker at all times.” I asked Marge about it the first time I saw it, and she angrily said, “That’s bull %$#&.” That pious lady’s salty language astounded everyone.

Still another patient I saw loved Elvis, so I played Elvis for her every time I visited. One day I took her a photograph of Elvis. She looked at it and immediately exclaimed, “It looks just like him!” I had to stifle my laughter.

Finally, a lady was visiting one of my patients – I’ll call her Pat – one evening. Pat told her visitor that her grandparents had been there visiting the previous night. (Of course, they’d been dead for decades.) Anyway, Pat told her visitor some of the topics they had discussed, then said, “I just didn’t have the nerve to tell them they were dead!”

Dementia Care Resources is a valuable patient and caregiver resource guide from Kansas City Hospice & Palliative Care for patients and family members alike.

Marie Marley has been a volunteer patient visitor for Kansas City Hospice & Palliative Care since 2019. In 2023 Ingram’s Magazine named her a Hero in Healthcare for her volunteer service. Marie is also the author of Come Back Early Today: A Memoir of Love, Alzheimer’s and Joy. Visit her at ComeBackEarlyToday.com.