{"id":545226,"date":"2025-11-03T00:51:15","date_gmt":"2025-11-03T00:51:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/545226\/"},"modified":"2025-11-03T00:51:15","modified_gmt":"2025-11-03T00:51:15","slug":"my-dad-started-acting-strangely-and-the-truth-was-devastating","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/545226\/","title":{"rendered":"My dad started acting strangely and the truth was devastating"},"content":{"rendered":"

A Bristol mum says she’s witnessed an upsetting decline<\/p>\n

Emmeline Saunders<\/strong> and Emma Slee<\/strong><\/p>\n

20:34, 02 Nov 2025<\/p>\n

\"HayleyHayley O’Rourke with her dad Tony Bullock , 76(Image: collect supplied)<\/p>\n

Prunella Scales, the beloved Fawlty Towers star who passed away on Monday, was one of nearly a million people in the UK living with dementia<\/a> – Alzheimer’s disease being the most common cause. Despite its prevalence among the elderly, it is not a normal part of ageing.<\/p>\n

Bristol mum-of-two Hayley O’Rourke, 39, who works full-time in HR for the National Grid, has first-hand experience of this, as her father, Tony Bullock, 76, was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s in 2023.<\/p>\n

She says: “It’s a juggle being a ‘sandwich carer’. Dad moved in with us 10 years ago, and while he still knows his family, he can get angry and aggressive with us – it’s hard helping the children understand why he’s being that way.<\/p>\n

“The change in the last two years has been unbelievable. He was fun-loving, sociable, he played with the kids. Now he doesn’t even say hello – he has no interest in them.<\/p>\n

“He was the most amazing dad but we started noticing signs something wasn’t quite right. He hit the neighbour’s wall in his car and just drove off – he used to have integrity. He started behaving strangely in social situations, he couldn’t read social cues. And whenever I challenged him he would just stare through me.<\/p>\n

“I was almost relieved when his diagnosis explained what was happening.<\/p>\n

\"HayleyHayley O’Rourke with her dad Tony Bullock , 76(Image: collect supplied)<\/p>\n

“I’ve had to give him an AirTag to wear when he goes out because he gets confused. I obtained Power of Attorney for him after 25 boxes of Graze snacks turned up – he didn’t remember ordering them.”<\/p>\n

Hayley is orchestrating the Forget Me Not spring charity ball at Aerospace Bristol <\/a>on Friday, 6 March 2026, with all proceeds going to Alzheimer’s Society. She hopes for a full house.<\/p>\n

“The hardest thing is losing a piece of him every day. I’ve had therapy to learn how to differentiate between the Dad in my head and the one in front of me,” she shares.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A Bristol mum says she’s witnessed an upsetting decline Emmeline Saunders and Emma Slee 20:34, 02 Nov 2025…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":545227,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8818],"tags":[231,192,381,748,393,4884,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-545226","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-bristol","8":"tag-alzheimers-disease","9":"tag-bbc","10":"tag-bristol","11":"tag-britain","12":"tag-england","13":"tag-great-britain","14":"tag-uk","15":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115483029878208476","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/545226","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=545226"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/545226\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/545227"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=545226"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=545226"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=545226"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}