Dame Barbara Windsor’s Alzheimer’s gets worse at night.
The ‘EastEnders’ star was diagnosed with the degenerative brain condition in 2014 and her husband Scott Mitchell has admitted he finds it most difficult to deal with in the evenings as she keeps asking whose house they are in.
Speaking on BBC Radio 2’s Steve Wright in the Afternoon, Scott said: "There’s good and bad days, the confusion does progress and that becomes a lot more stressful for her to live with and you as the carer to watch. I think what I’ve learnt by talking to other people is its very different for every case. It’s very simple things that used to be very easy, whether that’s signing something or writing a letter, opening something … At times very frustrating and irritable. It gets worse at night, with Barbara, it’s to do with our house. She constantly asks me over and over again at night whose house is this, are we staying here, is this house I grew up in with my mummy."
Speaking back in January, Scott – who is in training to run for Dementia Revolution at the Virgin Money London Marathon on April 28 alongside some of Barbara’s former co-stars – insists he has no plans to move Barbara into a care home as they’re just taking things "day by day".
He said: We just take things day by day. I haven’t spoken to Barbara – about the end of her life. There is a lot of Barbara that is still very much present, and I think you have to be very sensitive when you talk to people who are actually living with the illness. There is a sensitivity. You talk about certain things, you talk about the reality of a lot of things. But I think one has to be careful about not traumatising or suddenly causing thoughts that may not be there at the moment."
Dame Barbara Windsor’s Alzheimer’s is worse at night
