My elderly Mom's always saying she is sick and I constantly take her to the doctor. What's wrong with her?

Boredom. She has nothing to worry about but herself. Get her into daytime activities at a Senior Center near you. Now is the time to take her to look at Assisted Living, "just in case" she needs it. We did that, and Mom agreed to a one month trial.

LalaBoss, I know exactly what you're talking about. My mother is always sick. In her case, it is every day. The doctors can rarely find anything, so it mostly hypochondria. There has also been some self-inflicted things from scratching and using skin preparations wrong. For a few months we chased around, trying to find out what was wrong, wasting a lot of time and running up the Medicare bill. Finally I said enough. Now I take her only when it is scheduled or when I feel she needs to go. The worst thing about hypochondria is that I have a hard time judging when she is really ill. She cries wolf so much that it doesn't mean anything anymore. I have to notice other things that tell me something is wrong.

This reminds me -- my mother had some nausea that was pretty bad from what she said. We ran around doing MRIs and other things, trying to figure out what was wrong. It turned out she was taking too much metformin. I discovered it when I counted her pills. Of course she was sick! The drug was making her ill. She also had an episode from overdosing on Aricept for two days. Again, I discovered what was going on by counting pills. These type things stopped happening, of course, when I took charge of her medications. If your mother likes pills and has dementia, it is something to look out for.

I think my mother may see a doctor's visit like a date. She has become less interested in going to the doctor now that her PCP retired and she has a new one. That tells me a lot.

Well, I have to agree with JessieBelle. I don't know if my mom looks at doctors' visits as a "date", but her doctors are all male, and she sure does flirt with them. Big smile, nodding as if she understands what they are saying, and when we leave, she asks what went on. (She has hearing problems.) People mistake us for sisters all the time (I am 60, she is 85), plus she really is attractive. The doctors tell her how young she looks, and how great she seems. So, we hear about that for days afterwards. My mom also talks about her health and her loneliness quite a bit, and I have to understand that there is little else in her life to discuss. Don't know if this helps, but thought I'd share.

Find a daytime activity for her. There are usually one or more available in a community. See reommendations above, both are great

You are not saying what her diagnosis is, but one that gets overlooked by general doctors is depression. There is no physical illness, but the person still feels "sick". Take her to a psychiatrist and try an antidepressant.

My mom does the exact same thing only since my husband and son have diagnosed depression I recognized the symptom immediately. It started for my mom 9 years ago after by-pass surgery while she was living with me from Feb. till the beginning of June. At did not want to have her put on medication just yet because I knew that it could be a side effect from the surgery. Come the beginning of June we hosted a big party for my son's HS graduation and lots of people talked to my mother all afternoon long. Starting the next day the whining had stopped, feeling sick and complaining had stopped too! Fast forward a few years later and after what seemed a snowy season all winter she started calling 3-4 times a day whining about not feeling well when I knew that I had heard this in her voice before. I went and got her and brought her down to my house for a change. After a few weeks when the depression did not lift I called her Dr. and he started her on a low dose of anti-depressant. Actually I had a lot of it on hand because our son's switched anti-depressants. After a few days her depression went away. My mom is in a ALF now and the same whining began again several weeks ago but I never saw it nor did they tell me that she was complaining of feeling sick. They said that every morning she would say she felt sick but then after breakfast she would feel ok again. I went up to see her and asked to see her list of medications. Low and behold for some reason after she was released from the hospital in Dec. 2013 they had listed her anti-depression medication at 50mg and not the 100mg that she had been on for 4 years!!!! I don't know how or why that was missed but a call to her Dr. immediately got the medicine increased back to where it should be. She no longer is complaining of not feeling well!
The "sick" feeling that depressed people have usually can not be explained easily by them. But one tell tale sign is that if after having a meal their mood is often elevated for awhile then they will go back down in emotions. This is because serotonin is the "feel good hormone" and is released after you eat. I have seen this reaction numerous times with my son and husband during medication changes of their anti-depressants. Please ask your mom's Dr. about depression.

My 87 yo dad started taking an anti-depressive that gave him moderate to severe nausea. He figured it out, tho. He's hypochondriacal most of the time, but that medication really made him feel nauseated.

My mom does it for attention. She had a serious illness when she was young and learned that if you're sick enough people will drop everything and run to your bedside with cookies. This has followed her for her entire life. She has no friendly relationships and fills that human need with doctor visits instead of relationships. She will "break up" with doctors for telling her to lose weight, eat differently, get exercise, or basically do anything other than take another pill. She absolutely hates female doctors because she can't make cow eyes at them and get a response. It's embarrassing to watch honestly, ends up putting her health at risk because she doesn't take the visits seriously, and may not actually tell the right details to treat her properly.

My mom for years had no health problems and would be so happy when the doctor would make remarks about her being his poster child for not having high blood pressure at her age. But when he told her that she had severe osteoporosis after having a bone density scan, she got very indignant and insisted she did not! She still says that even though she is now so bent over she can no longer stand up straight. She used to love going to the chiropractor so she could list for him all the activities she had been doing and he would brag on her. The last time she was able to go she sat there in tears because there is no longer anything she can do that gets the praise she always got before. Really sad. She is 92 and her mind is still sharp so she works on crossword puzzles, plays Solitaire on her iPad and reads. So thankful she is able to stay occupied.

My 91 yr old mother also is always saying she is sick. She will tell you she hasn't been well in 50 yrs. Early in her life she learned that if you are sick you get attention and get out of doing things you don't want to do. She has been on pills one kind or another for depression since my father died 30yrs ago. Now that she is homebound (in my home) she sees a dr visit like a social activity. She doesn't want to go to senior centers because there she isn't the center of attention at the dr office she is. It's hard to deal with.

My mother literally came out of depression a few days after she was showered with attention from party guests (who knew she had been sick) who had come to my son's graduation party. I guess the fact that I had been caring for her at our house for 3 months while she recuperated didn't give her enough attention!!! Maybe you can have a few friends over for lunch and the table conversation may make her feel included and lift her up!!

Depression is real and must be addressed or people will do what your mother does. Therapeutic counseling, perhaps medication, definitely more and varied socializing. Help hrr make a change.

I know how it feels,my mum has a new illness almost every week,shes spent her life going to the doctors/hospital/chemist.Even as a child all I ever remember is her lying in bed because she had something or other,I think it was always trying to get attention off my dad who was only ever interested in getting to the pub.Over the years she has claimed to have,Cancer,TB,Lupus ,Hernia,Diabitus,High blood pressure,Epilepsy,Meningitus,Chest infection,Ear infection,Winter vomiting Bug,Kidney stones,Heart attack,Chicken pox,you name it shes had it!.If im ever ill( which is rare) she always got it too(,but its always worse).Once when I had terrible morning sickness she said she was feeling sick too!.When she goes to the doctor you get a full report about it the doctor said this and the doctor said that.I have learned now not to take any more notice and let her get on with it,being sick seems to make her happy!

Anxiety? My grandmother knows there's a problem with her memory, but she's constantly making doctor appointments about it. Like, they can't really help her (fyi, she takes herself to the doctor so I have no control really on how often she goes) I'm just waiting for them to tell her to stop calling them. Lol

My Mom [96] goes at least once a month to a variety of doctors throughout the year which I believe is just for reassurance.... it makes her happy when she hears "see you next year".

But if she does have a new medical problem no matter how minor, don't dare tell her the problem is age related.... she wants no part of hearing that ;)

Yes I can relate to everything that is being said. My mum is 93 and is staying with me. She hated the nursing home. She was allocated 28 days, only stayed 8.But doesnt want to live. She has been depressed for most of her life but wont have medication. The biggest worry for her is the biowels!! Any hints for this.

trying the best, get her doctor to give her a mild antidepressant, like celexa, which takes several weeks to restore her serotonin levels. And gosh, the next time she is in a NH, don't bail her out until she meets her PT goals. Make her work for it, like you would make a child earn a treat.

Hi Pamstegman,what is PT goals, thanks for your anwer to my question

Hello,
I am new here, but I wanted to post my experience. My Mom is 87 and has dementia. I am her caregiver and I feel guilty because I am having feelings of not wanting to be that person anymore. She calls me multiple times each day (she's living in a VERY luxurious independent senior living community) complaining of being "sick at her stomach". She has been complaining of nausea for five years. She never vomits, just "sick as a dog". She takes Zofran, which relieves it for a while, but given a few hours, she's back on the "I'm so sick" deal. She's seen 7 gastro docs and no one can find any reason for her nausea. She speaks of "getting over a bad illness", but there hasn't been one. She seems to obsess on medications, making taking them a full time job. She also seems to be unhappy if she isn't tracking multiple doctor appointments - as if they are her social life. Other than her cognitive impairment, she's perfectly healthy - even amazingly so for her age. Doctors all tell me how great she's doing, but they don't live my life every day and see how demanding and unhappy she is all the time. When we go to a doctor visit, she smiles, engages in conversation, etc. It's like the curtain goes up and she's "on"! Daily, she cries, yells at me, accuses me of "not believing" her when she says she's sick, and accuses me of "making her feel like she's a burden". It seems, no matter what I say or do, I'm the bad guy. Wow! Sorry to go on; it's clearly got me pushed to the edge :(

leighbird, my mother had a lot of nausea for a while. After chasing around trying to find out what was wrong with her, I counted her pills one day. She was taking too much of one of her medications for diabetes -- Metformin. The effects of taking too much were nausea and gas. After I learned what it was, she hasn't been sick again. I later learned she shouldn't even be taking the Metformin, so we took her off with no problem at all.

Sometimes the pills that they are taking don't agree with their stomachs. If your mother is taking many pills, I would check to see if that could explain her problem. Many medications can cause digestive upset that they won't be able to explain with any test.

My mother used to love to go to her male doctor. He was so nice to her. He wasn't a very good doctor, but he was nice to her. He retired, so we had to find a new doctor. Her new doctor is a young female geriatric specialist. My mother doesn't like her nearly so much, so she doesn't want to go to the doctor as often.

My narcissistic mother does this for attention, will see eye doctors, denturists, MD's, she gets all kinds of scans and tests and just loves it. This also gives her something to b**ch about when they can't find anything and then moves onto another ailment. When I was a child she was always hauling me off to a doctor . . . very munchausen by proxy like . . . until I was a teen and I was able to refuse and say there is nothing wrong with me that requires a doctor. I love it when she is in a hospital and a doctor catches onto her hypocondria, she get so frustrated and all of a sudden can't remember any of her history.

This all sounds like it's happening with aging parents. What about a mother who has been doing this since her 30's, when nothing really was wrong with her. She is now 57 and acts like she is 97, everything is wrong all the time. We don't live in the same state and haven't spoken in a couples of months, due to a lot of dysfunction and abuse that she continues to try and inflict on me. I sent her a card a few days ago to let her know that I am thinking about her and hoping she is doing all right. In return I get a voice mail about how she is even more sick, but how her neighbor has become like a son to her and another neighbor lady like a daughter to her. The way it is being presented, is like this piece of information deliberately wrapped into this giant gilt trip. I realize that she will never change, that seeking an excessive amounts of pity is how she associates it with receiving love. There is no other way with her. But it's still so hard to digest and deal with. I don't know what to say or do. I just can't feel any more pity, especially when she has ignored her health for years and made all the wrong choices that has lead her to not even being able to walk through the short park at 57 and she has no diagnosed illnesses. For years, I've tried to encourage her to move, to eat healthy when I would see her while visiting, the things and amounts on her plates would shock me. The last time she came to visit we had a huge falling out because I expressed concern about her health. A caring concern instead of pity has gotten me declared by her to be the enemy of the state. It was "Mexican Soap Opera" dramatic and over the top. Because of that, things has never went back to being the same, but at the same time, I can't imagine doing anything differently. Urgh...sing...I don't know what to do or how to be with her.

Skye78: welcome to the world of the histrionic borderline narcissist.
Otherwise known as cluster B personality disorders. You are in the right place!

My mother is this way too. It is through no fault of your own. This can happen to someone because of trauma, abuse, or the wiring in their brain they were born with. There is no cure. There is nothing you can say or do to change any of this and I am very sorry.

She may never be willing to fully disclose the real problems to a doctor for the real treatments: talk therapy, a lot of work on herself to deal with reality, and anxiety management. These folks tend to refuse to admit they are the one with the problems. It's the rest of the world.

My mother went down this same path and is now in a secure dementia unit for combative patients, diabetes, low liver, low kidney, high blood pressure. I was 43 years old before I got medical confirmation she was mentally ill before the dementia even began. This was really hard for me to swallow for some reason, even after living in it for all that time.

What you CAN do is help yourself. A lot of us have been through/are going through this ourselves, so you will get a lot of support and honesty here.

My way out came through some counseling, this site's support, and using books like Stop Walking on Eggshells, Surviving the Borderline Mother, and giving myself permission to feel the awful emotions all this causes like anger, resentment, embarrassment, etc.

I learned what going low/no contact was, and how it is part of the healing process and nothing to be guilty about.

I learned that I am entitled to boundaries, respect, and those are nothing to feel guilty about. My needs & my families needs have priority and I am not going to feel guilty about that either.

Mom's life is due to her choices and all the anxiety, sleepless nights, worry, and upset on my part will do not one bit of good.

When she became too demented to live alone safely, the whole thing landed in my lap to deal with. I could have walked away. Maybe I should have. I don't know. I did a big complicated rescue project for her that was expensive, time consuming, and just tragic to live through. I don't know which one is the right answer to this day. I felt like I at least needed to put her somewhere she'd be safe.

The first thing I would do is step back and meter out your time with her very sparingly. Take a break. Don't answer the phone. Get a book, a therapist, a support group, and start to reclaim your life.
Come back often and talk to us. ::hug::

I dont even know where to start. My dad is very sick 3 strokes,open heart surgery and knee replacement. Ive have a severe spinal cord injury and was in hospital for a month before they could diagnose me. She was pushing me in wheel chair sharing with anyone and everyone who would listen. Smiling and telling everyone she was having same surgery. As if it were a good thing. Later to find out nothing was wrong with her. Since then shes had every illness u can think of. I was at my dads helping him for about 5hrs. When i got back home which is one door down from my mom, surprisingly she made a comment " she said it hurts her feelings that i help my father every time he calls" i then said i see my father one day a week so when hes on floor and cant get up i rush to his side on my off day. Yes i do ,do that i said what are you saying? She got mad and huffy and i dont know what im saying. That was it..... wants me to come over and sit with her and talk i dont mind that if it wasnt in her bedroom every day. She never gets out of bed and is sick all day i cant take much more of this and sorry to say her. What do i do?

I met to say , i cant take much more of this and i cant take much more of her. She acts like a baby if she doesnt get attention. She has surgery every chance she can. Ive begged her not to have most of her surgerys because i know its for attention and ill be the one to have to be there because im so close. All of this has been layed on me to handle. My brother and sister wont even speak with her because theyve had enough and im not far from them.

Jack43 - I am so sorry.

These look to me like the universe says it's time for a change. Life is not supposed to feel like a never ending ride through hades.

You need an exit strategy. Being one door down is too close. Some geographic distance will help out enormously. The mental health toll a controlling person takes is real. You can't ever really relax. You can't ever truly be off duty. When they are looming over your every thought and moment of free time, your body will pay the price.

I would strongly, strongly, strongly recommend that one of you move. You do not owe any explanations. Quite frankly, with my mother, the less said the better. When I permanently left home and moved 1800 miles away, there were some academy award winning theatrics. I went anyway.

My mother always played the "sick" card to get attention. Oddly, every time she was feeling lonely, she had some kind of very dramatic major medical event. If she couldn't cry "wolf" she couldn't cry at all.

I started calling her bluff on her major medical problems. She would fake strokes, fake passing out, fake heart attacks, you name it. When she had a real stroke, I think it must have surprised her! She would start her fake chest pain and headaches, and I would pick up the phone to call 911. She would claim that she'd kill herself if I did x,y,z. I started saying "well, we'll give you a nice funeral if you do" and go about my business.

Mom tried this dramatic stuff with threats to kill herself in the senior apartments and it put her on psychiatric care, and ultimately on some psych meds she probably needed 40+ years ago if they had existed.

I would do what the rest of the family did a long time ago, and put yourself in a location where you can have boundaries and the ability to control life.

She wants attention

My mother is 81, soon to be 82. Each year we go to over 200 doctor visits, hospitals, emergency room and wound center visits. If anyone has managed to rack up a medicare bill in the millions, it has to be her. This past week she has been saying she was sure she was having a heart attack because her arms hurt. Now she said today she realized that her arms hurt because she has been using her walker and is not used to it, this is after several visits to the cardiologist who dismissed her and said she was not having a heart attack. She wanted a heart catheterization so bad that she said she was going to beg him for one, but he told her she had one within the last year and all was fine. We go to every kind of doctor that a person can imagine and unless she gets some kind of prescription from them when we leave, she is NOT happy. She LOVES taking pills, she'd rather take pills than eat. We have a real problem getting her to eat 3 meals a day and when she does it is just a few tiny bites of food. She is very self-destructive. Every other day she has a new "thing" that she needs to be seen by a doctor for.

On top of all that, my mother is obsessed with her looks. Take a look at her list and feel lucky that you don't have to deal with this sort of behavior: Things my mom has been to the doctor to have repaired or operated on, and the majority of these things were totally unnecessary:
Tear duct surgery; many colonoscopies, two for looking down her stomach to make sure she did not have bad breath; arthritis; says she has Sjorens disease; sleep apnea; asthma; heart problems; checking out her veins in her legs because she has poor circulation; cancer doctor to check out why her skin is turning black (due to aspirin consumption); had her bladder pinned up; put rods in her back so she would walk straight; extended the rods in her back; put a titanium cage in her back and front to help with her back problems; hair transplant; dental implants; breast implants; tummy tucks; numerous face lifts; eye lifts; shots for wrinkles in her chin, cheeks, around her eyes using different fillers and shots of Botox, Juvaderm and Resterol; she had her wrinkles lasered off above her lips twice; eye brows and eye liner tattooed on; teeth whitened; had her toes straightened; had her forehead pulled up; cut her ear lobes off (because old people have long ears); hemorrhoids repaired; hysterectomy; removed her appendix for no reason, just in case later in life she’d need them removed; kept going back to doctor after doctor to have her legs examined because they were weak and did not hold her up well; I told her it was because her spinal damage that the brain did not get it signals to the legs through the spine because of the damage; now she has a rash on her neck, arms an chest because the old breast implants have probably cracked and leaked silicone into her blood stream.

It never ends. I asked her when she was going to stop going to the cosmetic surgeon for those face shots and she replied, "NEVER. Not until I'm dead." An obsessive compulsive person used to always getting their own way, no matter what, is very difficult to deal with. She is 81, as I mentioned, and it is hard to be around a mother that looks younger than I do, since I'm 20 years younger...it's embarrassing. Don't get me wrong, I do love my mother. I just find it difficult to deal with this on a daily basis. My mom loves to be the center of attention and she sure knows how to get it. I do a lot of praying, believe me.

My mother in law has one complaint after another. She goes to multiple doctors (to "get to the bottom of this") who tell her most of her problems are just normal aging ones. She has gotten pain pills from several doctors and wonders why she is dizzy etc. When she calls she sounds like she's dying and in an instant sound just as normal as anyone else. I know the doctors must hate to hear her name (I work in health care). Keeps my husbands nerves torn up all the time. All of her children have real health problems much worse than hers. I had cancer and I couldn't top her inner ear spells. She called to tell us her sister in law died, one minute later it was all about how bad off she was. Even death can't top that woman. Like the boy who cried wolf, he's afraid the one time he ignores her calls something will be really wrong. She's fine when SHE wants to do something. This is not an elderly thing, She has been self-centered as long as I have known her (over 40 years). Any way thanks for letting me vent.

LEIGHBIRD- OMG! I could have written what you wrote! It is my Mother verbatim! How have you handled it?? I don't know what to do... my Mother spends 8 out of 10 days in bed. The constant complaints about her health and the Doctors never find anything wrong. We are always asking her to eat healthier and get out of bed and move around.. she won't.