How to Keep Your Loved Ones Independent

Tena L. Scallan has some great suggestions for "How to Keep Your Loved Ones Independent" in Caregiver.com, the free newsletter for Today's Caregiver magazine. 

Two of her suggestions resonate most with me. One is understanding that changes in your loved one's physical abilities will most likely be accompanied by emotions. Whether it's a temporary setback, like post-surgery rehab, or permanent decline, your loved one may well exhibit symptoms of depression. None of us likes to face the new reality of lost independence and increased dependence. I would learn what you can about the grief process, because your loved one is experiencing a loss, and so are you as you newly set aside a part of your own life to care for someone's new need.

The other one of Scallan's suggestions that I feel compelled to stress is paying attention to your loved one's dietary habits. This can be challenging, especially if Dad's only pleasure these days is a chocolate frosted donut with his morning coffee. But I encourage you to find a reliable source of information about dietary needs in the elderly, or in whatever other people group your loved one falls in (for example, people with MS or Alzheimer's or diabetes). I might offer the Mayo Clinic or Cleveland Clinic as reliable sources of health info, but you can find others as well. Zero in on fiber and fluids, as Scallan mentions. And try to limit your gifts of sugary treats.

To read Tena Scallan's other practical tips for keeping your loved one independent, click here.

Extending Independence with Dignity

Finally, a snazzy, jazzy way to get help if you fall! It's the Kanega Watch. 

To learn about its inspiration and inventor, Jean Anne Booth, read her interview with Gary Barg, Editor-in-Chief of Today's Caregiver magazine. (link here)

To learn more about this unique medical alert watch, Kanega Watch, go to the UnaliWear site.

A Nice Touch by Cyndie Goins Hoelscher

To pass along helpful hints, I frequently post links to Caregiver.com posts and Today's Caregiver articles. Today I would like to share with you one of their posts that is simply beautiful. Beautiful language, creative presentation of grief's hues, and powerfully encouraging.

Here is the article, "A Nice Touch," by Cyndie Goins Hoelscher.

Caregiver Book Club

Take a look through the twenty book club recommendations by Today's Caregiver here.

Here are just four that look interesting:
The Soul of Caregiving
A Guide for Caregiving: What's Next
Dementia Caregiver
The Ultimate Compassionate Guide to Caregiving

Lots of interesting choices for various aspects of caring for loved ones.

Living with Your Home Health Care Aide

Your home is your castle. You're used to storing your eggs on the left-hand middle shelf of your fridge and your coffee beans in the cupboard right above the coffee maker. You keep your checkbook handy on top of your desk.

Now you need in-home help. In addition to anxiety over compatibility with a stranger in your home, you wonder if you need to take security measures, or if you'll be able to find your things in their customary places.

Kim Champion's article in Today's Caregiver might put your mind at ease about some of these issues. Just click on Living with Your Home Health Care Aide to read her great advice.

"Pascal, Passports, and Past Regrets" in Today's Caregiver magazine.

Today's Caregiver magazine printed my article, "Pascal, Passports, and Past Regrets" in its May-June issue. I describe a caregiving day when my mom inspired me by not regretting and my dad encouraged me to let go of one of my regrets. My mother is truly Queen of Graceful Transitions, even in the face of loss. The article includes examples of conversation tips when speaking with a person in mid-stage Alzheimer's. You can read it here.

The whole issue of Today's Caregiver is worth a look, and you can access it by clicking this link. Some topics include
How to Cook for a Loved One with Dysphagia (difficulty swallowing)
The Marilu Henner Interview
Listen to Your Symptoms: When to Seek Emergency Care
Personality Change: A Family Member's Perspective
After 20 Years of Caregiving: Some Realizations

Living and Laughter with Alzheimer's

 I’ve written a number of previous posts for this blog about my “entertainment” role as my father’s Alzheimer’s progressed. Always such a serious kid, I could not possibly have imagined myself as class clown. Dad was the nutty punster who always made me laugh. But when Dad’s disease progressed to the bleak stage, I instinctively knew my job was to bring him joy. That included making him laugh. I brought him joke books in a tote bag I dubbed my “bag of tricks.” I recalled funny family stories that he enjoyed. I played silly videos for him. It did us both good to laugh together.

Jim Greenwood’s “Living and Laughter with Alzheimer’s” article in Today’s Caregiver’s online newsletter is an excellent reminder of this. And he includes some good jokes! Click on this link to read his article. Greenwood has also authored a book called Alzheimer’s: Medical Science and Families Are Still Asking Why.

Finding Balance for the Caregiver: 16 Stress Reducing Strategies

Lisa Bailey’s 16 Stress Reducing Strategies article in Today’s Caregiver is the best I’ve read on the subject. Many of her strategies focus on various aspects of communication, but she has some insightful tips focusing on comfort and perspective as well. I encourage you to read Finding Balance for the Caregiver: 16 Stress Reducing Strategies here.

A Balancing Act: Need for Home Modifications

"A Balancing Act" is an apt title for this article from Today’s Caregiver at Caregiver.com. Not only do you worry about your mom or dad’s loss of balance, but you also need to balance your protective measures with their tolerance for and adaptability to change. Timing is an equally important balancing act.

In her article, “A Balancing Act: Simple Steps to Help Seniors See the Need for Home Modifications,” Mary Becker-Omvig, MS, OTR-Lfa, gives a thorough, thoughtful overview of what you as caregiver need to balance in approaching the home modification issue, and she gives good suggestions for possible home modifications. I recommend reading the article at the hyperlink above.

I like that Becker-Omvig begins with a reminder that your parents are comfortable and already feel safe in their home. Persuading them that a change would be safer could be a challenge. Very true. I might add that sometimes your parent knows best. For example, after a knee replacement, my mother’s occupational therapy team sent her home from the rehab center with a bedside commode. My sister, mother, and I positioned this commode as we theoretically thought it would work best. My mother could get out of bed in the middle of the night and only have to turn 180 degrees to sit down on the commode. This seemed ideal. After one or two nights, however, our mother decided that this was not practical for her; and in fact, walking to the bathroom on her walker was more practical. The commode is now, sans bucket, over her toilet so that she doesn’t have to sit down so far and so that she has hand rails by her toilet. So be it. Not as we had planned, but Mom is happy and so far, safe. Two balancing acts right there: hers and ours.

I would also like to add to Becker-Omvig’s list of practical modifications. A caregiving agency nurse visited my mother’s home and insisted we move Mom’s dresser so that Mom would have a straighter shot from the bed to the bathroom in the middle of the night. We were for that. Mom pushed back. She didn’t want the dresser moved. She pointed out the dresser’s usefulness as something to grab if she did lose her balance. Instead, Mom had someone come and remove her bathroom door so that she didn’t have to negotiate that in the middle of the night. Score another one for Mom. Sometimes kids just have to listen to their parents.