Cathy Cress

Expert in Aging Life and Geriatric Care Management

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Ten Warning Signs That You Are Working With in a Dysfunctional Family

January 16, 2021

Warning Signs of Aging Dysfunctional Family – Contentiouness, Anger, and Cut Off

Do you know the 10  clinical manifestations that you are working with the dysfunctional family, the most challenging job of an aging professional. What you have to know is family system theory and be clinically skilled in entering this treacherous family system – to get care for an older person

1. Contentiousness – Old fights erupt; the siblings and parent get into arguments with one another about an old issue

2. Anger – Siblings and family members express physical anger, emotional abuse, financial abuse

 

 

3. Distancing & cut off – Some siblings or parents have nothing to do with family and may not speak to parents or siblings for long periods of time.

Warning Signs of Aging Dysfunctional Family – Fusion, Denial, Triangulation, Entitlement

4. Fusion – Siblings and family members, such as the mother and eldest daughter, blend into one another, For example, the daughter’s sounds, acts, and has the same prejudices as the mother. . Think of the media’s portrayal of Lindsay Lohan and her mother.

5. Denial – Adult siblings do not see a decline in a parent, do not face reality, and do not take care of the parent if he or she needs care.

6. Triangulation – Tension between two family members or siblings causes one to enlist a third family member or sibling to avoid change For example, two adult sibling object to the cost of care of an aging parent. They gang up on the third adult sibling who thinks the cost of care is reasonable and justified.

7. Sense of Entitlement – Siblings who are accustomed to purchasing services they need not personally solving their own, children’s sibling or parents’ problems. This lack of engagement leaves them, unprepared and unwilling in getting involved in solving family tribulations.

Warning Signs of Aging Dysfunctional Family – Narcissism, Needy Adult Siblings, Substance Abuse and Cut Off

8. Narcissism – One or more siblings has an “it’s all about me” attitude and

other siblings resent this. The self-absorbed sibling either does not participate

9. Needy Adult Siblings – These adult siblings feel starved for affection and often seek affection from professionals and other people in their lives for compensation for the care they didn’t receive as children.

10 . Substance and Other Abuse – The family and siblings have a history of drug, alcohol, and/or child abuse.

If this fits you you and your aging parent needs care may need to contact a geriatric care manager.

Sign Up for My Free January Webinar  

5 Vital Clinical Tools to Help Aging Dysfunctional Families-Post Horrid Holidays- 

             Thursday, January 21, 2021

F

  Give frantic adult children hope when they desperately call after the holiday  

 Join me and learn how to come to the rescue of concierge dysfunctional families who found coal in their stocking.      

Learn how to!

  • Understand the Dysfunctional Aging Family System you must enter to get care for elders
  • Understand 11 Warning Signs You Are Working with Dysfunctional Family
  • Master Vital Clinical Tools you to solve client problems
  • Take Six Steps Professional Must Take to Work with These Difficult Families
  • Get care for aging family members when the dysfunctional family members resist

 SIGN UP NOW

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

 

 

Filed Under: abusive aging parents, adult child physical abuse, Adult children, aging family crisis, aging family system, Aging Life Care, Aging Life Care Assocaition, Aging therapist, Dysfunctional aging family, Dysfunctional Family Inquiry, Dysfunctional Family System, elder abuse, elder care manager, elder fiscal abuse, elder mediator, entitled family, estranged siblings, FREE WEBINAR, GCM COACHING SKILLS, geriatric care manager, geriatric care manager start up, midlife siblings, Siblings Tagged With: adult children of borderline narcissistic VIP families, aging family, blaming familiy members, boundaries dysfunctional families, Clinical Tools Dysfunctional Holiday, cut -off, cut-off sibling, dysfunctional aging family, geriatric care manager, help with dysfunctional family, midlife siblings, Narcissistic Personality, sibling, Substance abuse in the elderly

Dread Memorial Day with Midlife Sibings?

May 23, 2013

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Are you dreading the Memorial Day family barbeque?  . Will your estranged brother be manning the barbeque while you drink too much beer?

Are you a midlife sibling at war with sister or brother? Worse than that, do you feel like you and all your siblings are in not only a dysfunctional family but also an aging dysfunctional family?

What’s an aging dysfunctional family? Well they are very much like a war zone. Clans remain at war with each other, like the 1980’s Serbian conflict or the Iraq war pitting the Sunni’s against the Shia.These tribal battles have gone on for centuries and have the same bloody roots of the dysfunctional family -repeated from one generation to the next.

The hallmarks of the dysfunctional aging family, are after decades as a motley clan there is still not enough love in the family. The now midlife children have to fight for what little nurturance their older parents can bring to the ancient rickety nest they built.

Nurturing is often missing in the dysfunctional aging family because the aging parents themselves probably got little nurturing themselves as kids and on and on back down the family line. Parental neglect and abuse are frequent in the history of the aging dysfunctional family.

The now older parents can suffer from serious mental health problems such as schizophrenia or are bi-polar. Health and addiction problems like alcoholism are frequent.  Family interaction and communication, -parental treatment of siblings, brother and sister treatment of each other stepparent interaction and interface of everyone in the family has wrought deep tissue damage that never healed.

These aging dysfunctional families generally negotiated all of life’s developmental phases with great difficulty. The role in the family, especially the parental one, was murky with a poor, abusive or mentally unfit leader of the family. The rules in the family were unfair ambiguous or full of double binds. There is deep-seated ambivalence. Finally the last life transition in the aging family, the care of the declining parent, implodes the family, which had little balance to begin with. They are asked to care for parents who did not care for them, thus reeking havoc on an already disorganized aging family.

So good luck at the Memorial Day family gathering and perhaps consider hiring a geriatric care manager if you sibling war is affecting not only rituals like family gatherings but also the care of your aging parents. The GCM can help you end the constant hangovers and /or acid reflux.

 

Filed Under: Aging Tagged With: aging parent, aging parent care, assessing the caregiver, blaming familiy members, blood brother, celebrations with siblings, dysfunctional aging family, dysfuntional family, estranged siblings, family meeting, geriatric care manager, geriatric care managers, half siblings, holidays with aging parents, irate siblings, Marriage and Family Therapist, MFT, midlife siblings, Mom Loves You Best Forgiving and Forging Sibling Relationships, My Geriatric Care Management Operations Manual, NAELA, National Association of Geriatric Care Managers, sibling emotional violence, sibling family meeting, sibling rivalry, sibling team, siblings feuding, visiting aging parets during holidays

Undue Influence- New York Times

March 28, 2013

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New York Times article -Undue influence – perhaps -committed on  a renowned painter Merton D. Simpson and major  collector of African art . Mr. Simpson is dead and housed in funeral home until someone pays for funeral. Aging professionals-  you just never have seen it all.

Filed Under: Aging Tagged With: aging parent care, blaming familiy members, case manager, death, dementia, dysfunctional aging family, elder abuse fiscal assessment, Elder Legal Assessment, elderlaw attorney, estranged elder siblings, financial abuse, geriatric care management, geriatric care manager, geriatric care managers, guardianship, My Geraitric Care Management Operations Manual, National Association of Geriatric Care Managers, protecting elder assets

Solve Adult Sibling Problems Cathy Cress on WHBC Radio Tomorrow

February 10, 2013

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Tomorrow morning I will be on radio show Wriggling in the Middle , 8 AM EST ,speaking with Dr. Merle Griff and DeLores Pressley Wriggling In The Middle hosts  on how adult sibling relationships affect the caregiving process in the aging family. This is especially important when an older person needs care or home modification.

Tune in

 

Radio- Wriggling In The Middle

News Talk 1480

WHBC Radio in Canton, OH.

the show is broadcasted live from WHBC.

Filed Under: Aging Tagged With: adult sibling, aging family, aging parent crisis, blaming familiy members, Care Managers Working with the Aging Family, crisis with aging parents, geriatric care manager, geriatric care managers, half sibing family meeting, half-sibling, inheritance, midlife sibling team, Mom Loves You Best Forgiving and Forging Sibling Relationships, role of youngest siblings, sibling family dynamics, sibling teamwork, siblings and caregiving, step siblings

Senior Care Management Workshop on Midlife Siblings- Lawrenceville, NJ

October 13, 2012

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Coming Up on October 17th, I will be presenting a workshop

How to Help Midlife Siblings Move Towards Forgiveness to Form a Team to Care for Elderly Parents .

The Workshop location is :

Morris Hall
1 Bishops Dr, Lawrenceville, NJ 08648

Sponsored By Senior Care Management http://www.seniorcaremgt.com

Contact

Senior Care Management

(609) 882- 0322

Why should you attend ?

1) Build a better knowledge base of the aging family

system

2) Identify ‘nearly’ normal family systems where midlife

crisis with aging parent is present and create

interventions to assist midlife siblings reach filial maturity

3) Identify midlife sibling dysfunction and understand forgiveness

tools to enhance therapeutic interventions and get aging parents better

care


Course Outline

9-10.Adult- Siblings – Types, Roles, Rules , Siblings Rivalry , Midlife and in old age power point and guided discussion

break 10 minutes

10:10- 11-. Midlife Siblings in the Aging Family -Stress and Burden in Caregiving

What is the Role of the Aging Professional ? guided discussion and power point

Break 10 minutes

11:10- 12:10 Mom Loves You Best and I Hate You Helping Midlife Siblings Forgive and Forge Lifelong Relationships and Care for Aging Parents- guided discussion and power point

12:10-12:30- Questions – wrap up discussion

3.0 Contact Hours and CEU credits

approved for nurses and social workers.

Certificates to be distributed at end of series.

Registration Required

•

 

Filed Under: Siblings Tagged With: aging family, aging parent care, aging parent crisis, Aging Professional communication with adult siblings, blaming familiy members, blended family, Cain and Abel, divorce, elder law attorney, elder siblings with spcial needs, family meeting, geriatric care manager, Handbook of Geraitric Care Management, irate sibling, midlife sibling, nearly normal family, parent care, sibling team, Worshop Mom Loves You Best

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