Need to vent over scams and taking advantage of the vulnerable

Posted by akela09 @akela09, May 26 8:08am

Yesterday morning my husband “ who as been diagnosed with vascular dementia “ walked into the kitchen and started telling me about this amazing supplement endorsed by Bill Gates that could stop or reverse dementia, but it was really expensive and he was hesitant to try it. I knew immediately it was a scam, however I didn’t say anything because he just sounded so hopeful, at the same time my blood was boiling over people taking advantage of the vulnerable. After thinking about it for a while I decided to look up information concerning the ad so I could show him the truth, thankfully he accepted it and understood, but it got me thinking about all the other people that don’t have a advocate for them and they fall for these scams. I still feel so disgusted and angry over the hold thing.
I wanted to share to maybe prevent someone else from falling for this and to also ask has anyone else been through this and how did you handle it.

Interested in more discussions like this? Go to the Caregivers: Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI) & Dementia Support Group.

Profile picture for JennFH @jenniferkr

Yes, I restricted my husband's access to any funds and his credit card (in my name) has a monthly limit so if he gets scammed it will not be for too much. I can up the credit limit as needed if for some reason his expenses are higher than expected with a simple phone call. As his dementia progressed I have also limited the calls he can receive on his cell phone by restricting to his contacts only. Any other calls do not ring. That has greatly reduced my anxiety on worrying about scams.

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@jenniferkr changing his phone is a great idea, I hadn’t thought of that. Now if I could only get him off Facebook 🫤

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Profile picture for akela09 @akela09

@jenniferkr changing his phone is a great idea, I hadn’t thought of that. Now if I could only get him off Facebook 🫤

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@akela09 can you restrict Facebook as if he was a child? I am unsure, gratefully, my husband does not do it.

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@susanejw
My husband is in the same situation and has agreed that someone else would be the best judge of his driving. There is a local service that will do that in our county so check with local resources for and assessment. Right now he is driving but only by himself not even the dog so no passengers to distract him, and only local roads.

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Profile picture for kayco @kayco

@colleenyoung

I am new to this Connect and thank you for it. I hope I post this in the right place. My husband was diagnosed with aphasia and now showing signs of Alzheimer's. A month ago without telling he fell victim to a scam with an AI film of Bill Gates touting a product called Memocept. He spent $300 on a box of these pills. There is a real product called Memocept but the ingredients on his order do not match. Again unbeknownst to me he took these pills for a month. How do I keep him from spending money like this. Yes, of course, I have taken away his credit card, but I am still very worried about this. Thank you. PS I find this site difficult to use and can't find out how to submit this.

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@kayco I have my credit cards all send me a notice when any charge is made. It comes as a text or an email and has been very helpful also put a charge limit on the one card my husband uses.

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Profile picture for briggs54 @briggs54

@susanejw
My husband is in the same situation and has agreed that someone else would be the best judge of his driving. There is a local service that will do that in our county so check with local resources for and assessment. Right now he is driving but only by himself not even the dog so no passengers to distract him, and only local roads.

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@briggs54 Thanks. Yes, I was doing that, but then I started having to make a real effort to pay attention, and things sometimes didn’t go smoothly with errands. When I tried to multitask (find a way to change the display to show how fast I was going), I almost went into a ditch. So, no thanks. I don’t need that stress.

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Profile picture for JennFH @jenniferkr

@akela09 can you restrict Facebook as if he was a child? I am unsure, gratefully, my husband does not do it.

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@jenniferkr I had not thought of that! Great advice I will definitely look into it.

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Profile picture for JennFH @jenniferkr

Yes, I restricted my husband's access to any funds and his credit card (in my name) has a monthly limit so if he gets scammed it will not be for too much. I can up the credit limit as needed if for some reason his expenses are higher than expected with a simple phone call. As his dementia progressed I have also limited the calls he can receive on his cell phone by restricting to his contacts only. Any other calls do not ring. That has greatly reduced my anxiety on worrying about scams.

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@jenniferkr
How do you restrict calls to contacts only?

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Profile picture for akela09 @akela09

@jenniferkr I had not thought of that! Great advice I will definitely look into it.

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@akela09
I had to delete my husband's Facebook account due to him requesting service people that drove over an hour for services he'd requested via Facebook, more than once. Amazingly he's never said one thing about not seeing his Facebook app on his phone.

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So far I feel fortunate that my wife brings all (at least I think so) the scam requests to me for verification. I've made it clear that she is not "bothering" me and that I appreciate her asking me. Occasionally there will be a legitimate payment request (such as a medical co-pay). But she clearly cannot tell the difference. And fortunately she is unable to access personal and financial information to give out. I use a password manager with complicated passwords for all accounts, and she is unable to use the PW manager either.

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Profile picture for wctdoc1943 @wctdoc1943

So far I feel fortunate that my wife brings all (at least I think so) the scam requests to me for verification. I've made it clear that she is not "bothering" me and that I appreciate her asking me. Occasionally there will be a legitimate payment request (such as a medical co-pay). But she clearly cannot tell the difference. And fortunately she is unable to access personal and financial information to give out. I use a password manager with complicated passwords for all accounts, and she is unable to use the PW manager either.

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@wctdoc1943 How very sad.....but you sound like my kinda guy; involved, vigilant, caring, unswerving in your loyalty to her and to your relationship, and willing to do the heavy lifting when needs be. Good for you!

I'm sorta there with my wife. She depends a lot on me due to her various conditions, not least of which are two recent falls, one resulting in a broken wrist, the second three days ago where she broke her humerus....and nothing humerous about it...at all. Fortunately, she has been 'good' lately, engaged, energetic, not quite so beset as in the past two years with aches and pains. But she does know to come to me for unusual events on line where she feels she needs to act, or is being pressed to. My oft-repeated rule for her is to tell the caller that she will call the purported institution/amazon/whateveritis directly herself, and to promptly hang up. No use in extending the conversation, and she knows to end it immediately that way. Had to run over to my dad's place ten years ago the same afternoon I had migrated his laptop to Win10. He got a scam call from 'Microsoft Services' saying they noticed he had a virus. He had actually already given them remote access when he called. I'm a long distance runner, and I literally ran all the way to his place a few blocks away. He had hung up per my instructions, and force-stopped his laptop. They called just as I entered their apartment. Told them to buzz off, and to not call again. Ran a malwarebytes scan just in case and his computer was squeaky clean. Whew!

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