Cathy Cress

Expert in Aging Life and Geriatric Care Management

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How Storytelling Can Give Elders A Happier Family Thanksgiving

November 21, 2020

Want to increase aging parents and everyone’s enjoyment at Thanksgiving? Try storytelling using Thanksgiving memories.

As an aging professional, you can bring joy to an older person  through reminiscence, storytelling, and oral history even elders with dementia

This Thanksgiving, if you really do travel to a family home or grandma’s house, travel safely  If not make the safest choice, stay home and use zoom and include your elderly

parent. You can do this if they can use a computer or have a family member or friend who visits often and who lives nearby and is in their bubble serve and share Thanksgiving dinner at their home and use zoom with them to see other family members on the holiday.

Share Your Thanksgiving Story

If you are at a family member’s holiday dinner, ask everyone to tell their favorite story about a Thanksgiving dinner. Start with midlife members to get the idea and then ask

again parents to share their story. It will bring extra thanks to Thanksgiving by learning about an elder’s past and giving them the opportunity to share, which sometimes they do not do in the hubbub of family talking.

  The “telling ” also means someone documents. That magically gives the elder and a child social interaction and connectedness. Elders vividly recall their past by telling

from vignettes in their life – especially life in their 20’s, which sparks the richest recall called the “20’s bump”, according to researchers.

Elders sharing stories means passing on history.

So try this at Thanksgiving and it becomes intergenerational. The older person is given a chance to give the larger picture of their life and family history to children and grandchildren or extended family, who may not have heard all the details of their grandparent’s or parents’ life before. My 10 grandchildren have grown up with their now 80-year-old grandfather telling them exciting stories of when he was a California Highway patrolman.So a dual dose of a BeccaJulia-94.jpghigher quality of life for both the older person and the aging family is increased through oral history and reminiscence.

Capture Your Families Past Before It Is Gone

 Many midlife adults now do ancestry and regret that they did not ask questions of older family members when they were alive. Capture that past now on this family holiday. An aging professional or a geriatric care manager can suggest family or friends record the Thanksgiving story as oral history using technology like an i Phone or i Pad.

StoryWorth For Thanksgiving

Another great idea to capture reminiscence when elders are safely sheltering in place is giving them StoryWorth. 

Last Christmas my daughter, sent this gift to my her Dad and both he and I love it. Each week  StoryWorth sends a question to my husband that prompts him to write about his past. He writes his reminiscence out longhand and I easily use the dictation on my phone and email his story to Story Worth.

At the end of the year, my daughter will order a bound book of all the stories- a whole collection of memories that she might never think to ask and will be saved for her and her children to pass on family history. I will order a copy for all her three siblings. Equally important, my husband, who has been sheltering in place since March with me, really enjoys writing about his past and the prompts have brought many vivid memories back to him.

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8 Ways to Tame the Turmoil of the Holidays & Twindemic in the Aging Family

 Learn how!

  • How to sell services to the desperate Aging Family during the holiday surge
  • How to give hope to frantic children who call when their aging parent struggling with Loneliness and isolation on the holidays
  • How to help the Aging Family make holiday visits remotely or safely in person
  • How to counsel the Aging Family to track aging decline &Twindemic risk in loved ones
  • How to work with both dysfunctional and long-distance families who call during the holidays
  • How to use GCM tools to contain Holiday chaos
  • How to use financial forecasting to prepare for business growth during the holidays

Sidestep the Many Care Managers Who Do not know how to work with Dysfunctional family or do COVID Coaching of Aging Families so the client chooses you

THIS FREE WEBINAR IS Thursday December 3, 2020 FROM 2 PM – 3:30 PM PST

Sign Up Now

 

 

 

Find out more in the YouTube for My YouTube, Channel  Geriatric Care 1

 

 

 

Filed Under: Aging, Aging Family, Aging Life Care, aging life care manager, care manager, case manager, Coronavirus safety elders, COVID & HOLIDAY SEASON, Covid 19 Webinar, Dementia Activities, elder care manager, geriatric care manager, geriatric social worker, Holiday Rituals in Aging Family, nurse advocate, nurse care manager, Oral History, Quality of Life, Quality of Life and Reminicance, Quality of Life and Thanksgiving, Quality of Life for elders, Quality of Life with Dementia, Reminiscence Therapy, Remote Thanksgiving Family Visit, Thanksgiving, Thanksgiving Parent crisis, Thanksgiving Safe Visits to Grandma, Thanksgving visits during COVID, Therapist Specializing in Aging, Webinar Tagged With: aging family, aging life care manager, aging parent, aging parent care, aging technology, ancrestory.com, assessing for quality of life, care manager, care plan, care plan interventions, case manager, family caregivers, Family Caregivers using technology, genealogy, geriatric care management, geriatric care manager, geritaric care manager, grandfather, grandmothers, grandparents, increasing quality of life, LCSW, nurse advocate, nurse care manager, oral history, oral history and quality of life, oral history and You Tube, parent care, Quality of Life, quality of life assessment, reminicence and elder, reminisicsence technology, story telling elders, storytelling and elders, technology for caregivers, You Tube, You Tube and storytelling

How to Help Avoid a Cat and Dog fight at a Dysfunctional Family Thanksgiving

November 18, 2020

cat-dog-fight.jpg

Sparring Cats and Dogs

Especially after some holiday liquid cheer, sour step-parents, angry step-siblings, and mid-life adult kids who have grown up in a dysfunctional family can turn into sparring cats and dogs with teeth bared and claws dug in flesh, at Thanksgiving dinner.

 Why Their Stocking Full of Coal

As if COVID has not made the holidays hard enough for family gatherings, the ordinary aging processes are made far tougher when a family has a history of dysfunction. Aging professionals, like geriatric care managers, have their greatest challenges in working with these “difficult” families.

 

Dysfunctional families are not able to organize themselves

They effectively face gut-wrenching eldercare challenges and crises. These families are under more stress as they move from long-established roles into uncharted territory.

 Why Cut-OFF Ruins Holidays

What if adult kids “ cut off” their Dad years ago and now he had a severe stroke- what do they do?? Someone has to take over Mom or Dad’s care and these dysfunctional midlife adult kids are heavy ambivalent or just don’t want to do it.  They are caught between “ I love you” and “ I hate you” and it only takes a few drinks and snarky remarks to start a fracas.

 

Now that the holidays are soon arriving – they have the same attitude about attending the family Thanksgiving dinner.

 So what to do if you are an aging professional, geriatric care manager, nurse care manager- before the holiday to avoid the scene below.

family-fight-300x223.jpg

 

SIGN UP FOR MY WEBINAR

 

8 Ways to Tame the Turmoil of the Holidays & Twindemic in the Aging Family

 Learn how!

  • How to sell services to the desperate Aging Family during the holiday surge
  • How to give hope to frantic children who call when their aging parent struggling with Loneliness and isolation on the holidays
  • How to help the Aging Family make holiday visits remotely or safely in person
  • How to counsel the Aging Family to track aging decline &Twindemic risk in loved ones
  • How to work with both dysfunctional and long-distance families who call during the holidays
  • How to use GCM tools to contain Holiday chaos
  • How to use financial forecasting to prepare for business growth during the holidays

Sidestep the Many Care Managers Who Do not know how to work with Dysfunctional family or do COVID Coaching of Aging Families so the client chooses you

THIS FREE WEBINAR IS Thursday, December 3, 2020, FROM 2 PM – 3:30 PM PST

Sign Up Now

 

 

Find out more in the YouTube for My YouTube, Channel  Geriatric Care 1

 

 

 

Filed Under: Aging, aging family crisis, aging life business, Aging Life Care, Aging Life Care Assocaition, aging life care manager, Aging therapist, Blog, case manager, COVID & HOLIDAY SEASON, Covid Holiday Remote Visit, COVID Webinar, Dysfunctional aging family, Dysfunctional Family & Holidays, elder care manager, estranged siblings, Families, Geriatric Care Management Business, Geriatric Care Manager, geriatric care manager, geriatric social worker, Holiday Meltdown in Aging Family, Holiday on call, Holiday Rituals in Aging Family, Holiday season, Holiday Sibling Rivalry, Holidays, HolidaySeason and COVID, Long Distance Care, nurse advocate, nurse care manager, POST HOLIDAY CALLS, POST HOLIDAY SEASON, quality of life -COVID-19, Quality of Life and Reminicance, Siblings, Telehealth COVID-19products, TELEHEALTH HOLIDAY PLAN, Telehealth with ALCA, Telehealth with GCM, Thanksgiving, Thanksgiving & dysfunctional family, Thanksgiving and COVID, THANKSGIVING BLOG, Thanksgiving Parent crisis, Thanksgiving Safe Visits to Grandma, Thanksgving visits during COVID, Therapist Specializing in Aging, Webinar, ZOOM CHRISTMAS, ZOOM THANKSGVING Tagged With: aging dysfunctional family, aging family, aging life care manager, aging parent care, aging parent Thanksgiving, alcohol on the holidays, care manager, case manager, COVID THANKSGIVING VISIT, danger signs for holiday visit, drunken holiday, dysfunctional family on the holiday, GRANDMA VISIT THANKSGIVING, Holiday sibling rivalry, nurse advocate, nurse care manager, post holiday parent care, Thanksgiving, Thanksgiving with dysfunctional family, Thanksgiving with midlife siblings

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