Cathy Cress

Expert in Aging Life and Geriatric Care Management

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The Holiday Season is Upon Us & Can Be Caregiver Hell

October 21, 2022

Adult children usually see their elderly parents soon on Christmas, Hanukkah, and Thanksgiving- all major holidays.

The Holiday Season is upon us. Thanksgiving, Hannukkah, and Christmas are all coming up when families gather around ritual gatherings. Adult children can notice their aging parents’ struggling with memory, and speech, and preparing those ritual meals. Then midlife siblings may be alarmed by any behaviors that threaten the normal order they always experienced.

When The Holiday Season is upon us ,the discussion will turn to aging parents. Thanksgiving usually involves alcohol. With a normal family, discussing this when alcohol is involved may or may not be a good idea. In an aging long-distance family, this would be the time to set up a family meeting via teleconference or Skype when everyone is sober. You could just ask everyone if would gather ideas and you can discuss it at that time.

With elderly parent’s decline- everyone’s independence is threatened and anger and frustration can be rampant.

If adult siblings did make a  visit to elderly parents before Thanksgiving, it could have been bitter or sweet or it was just plain scary. This is why it is best to set up a post-thanksgiving meeting with all the siblings to discuss care, not when people are drinking more than they should on Thanksgiving.

 

 Adult children may decide they must intercede or offer direct help, even if it is rejected. Then family members who do not live nearby become long-distance care providers, joining 7 million others in the US.

Offer to Facilitate a Telephonic Family Meeting After Thanksgiving

The frightening part often happens when you haven’t seen an aging Mom or Dad for a while. If midlife siblings live long distance, making an occasional visit can set off alarms, especially if they find aging Mom or Dad has gone downhill. If they call you, offer to facilitate the call using your family meeting facilitation skills, to create an agenda with the family, and keep everyone on the topic of parental care in the here and now, rather than fracturing into an argument about the past or old family wounds. With a care manager as a facilitator, they will find your value.

Get Ready for the Holiday Rush
    • SIGN UP FOR MY HOLIDAY WEBINAR –

      The Holiday Season is upon us

      Get Ready for the Holiday Rush

      WEDNESDAY, November 16th, 2022, FROM 2 PM – 3:30 PM PST

       Learn how to create!

      • Pre-Holiday Social media campaigns to reach worried caregivers
      • Pre- Holiday-Materials about the warning signs that a parent needs help
      • Pre-Holiday Marketing to help you sign up families who might face a serious decline in aging parents
      • How to sell services to desperate  post-holiday callers from Normal dysfunctional & long-distance family
      • How to use tools to contain holiday chaos & arrange care in festive family fright
      • How to move the family to New Year’s stability
      • Position Your Agency ahead of Care Managers who do not have great pre-holiday marketing campaigns and lack the clinical skills how to work with Adult Children and families during the chaotic aging family holiday visit when adult kids find their aging parents need care
      • Featuring

       Cathy Cress MSW author of the Handbook of Geriatric Care

      Management        

      The Holiday Season is upon us.

       Find out more about how an Aging Life or Geriatric Care Manager can help.

  • Subscribe to my YouTube channel, Geriatric Care Management, at www.youtube.com/channel/UCaoHdozwS0RvKD23YPpuHIw

  • Visit my website at cathycress.com/

  • Follow me on Twitter at twitter.com/cathyjocress

Filed Under: Aging, Aging Alcohol Abuse, Aging Life Care, Aging Life Care Assocaition, aging life care manager, Blog, Christmas webinar, Dysfunctional Aging Familu, elder care manager, Families, Filial Crisis, Geriatric Care Management Business, Geriatric Care Manager, geriatric social worker, Grandchild gifts for grandma, Hanukkah Webinar, Long Distance Care, Long Distance Care Holidays, Marketing aging life care, Marketing during Holidays, marketing pitch, Marketing Strategy, marketing to long distance adult children, Nearly Normal Aging Family, New Years, nurse advocate, nurse care manager, Thanksgiving with Dysfuntional Family, Webinar ALCA GCM, Webinar care managers, Webinar COVID Safety Tagged With: aging family, Aging Life, aging life and geraitric care manager, aging life care, aging life care manager, alcohol on the holidays, Black, black aging family, black american geriatric care managers, black american social workers, Black Entrepreneurs, Black geriatric care managers, Black Nurse Entrepreneurs, Black RN's, Black travel nurses, care manager, case manager, crisis with aging parents, drinking on labor day, geriatric care manager, holidays with aging parents, Holidays with midlife siblings, Nearly Normal family inquiry holidays, nurse care manager, Thanksgiving Webinar, Thanksgiving with aging parents, Thanksgiving with dysfunctional family, Thanksgiving with midlife siblings

7 Tips to Make Labor Day Midlife- Sibling Stress Free

August 28, 2019

Dys-fam90264_CH22_FIG02.jpg

 

Happy Labor Day. 

If you are working with midlife siblings to solve elder care issues and they are attending a Labor Day barbecue-  

Here are 

Suggestions to make the ritual of Labor Day –  a holiday to be enjoyed by midlife siblings and their families  – not dreaded like the annual Thanksgiving dinner where Mom burns the turkey and your uncle gets drunk and sings. 

Here are 7 tips to help them keep the Labor Day heartburn free without a midlife sibling to build a midlife sibling team over aging Mom and Dad issues.

1) Don’t discuss politics. In this era of the Trump presidency with so many families at odds over President The Democratic Presidential Race ,Trump, the Russian hacking investigation, DOMA, the building of the ” Mexican Wall ” –politics can be lethal to families. Spare siblings, and guests. This is bloodier than the civil war with so many kin at opposite poles. So keep it positive and light or just plain pass the time of day. And whatever you do, don’t drink too much and forget the ban on politics.

2) Remember that it is a family gathering and it is not “all about you”.Suggest keeping a positive attitude for the sake of aging parents, if they are there,  and  kids, who will model bad sibling behavior when they face parent- care in the future

3) Call email or Facebook, Evite everyone ahead of time. Ask everyone to bring a dish to share. That is the beginning of building a sibling family team- sharing food. Call every midlife sibling and family member. Do not exclude. Again to build a team effort.

4) Attempt to get all midlife siblings to plan activities ahead and jointly work to make them happen-with a sibling team spirit. Think of softball games, horseshoes, and a treasure hunt, anything that everyone can have joint ideas about beforehand. Use Facebook to do this- hopefully, all your siblings are your Facebook friends.

5) Arrange to split the bill for beverages like alcohol and soft drinks, again sibling team effort. Remember to go light on alcohol because, like the recent Houston explosion caused by hurricane flooding, alcohol can detonate sibling warfare.

6) Share jobs- setting up tables, bringing in equipment for sports or games, lawn chairs- especially ‘manning” the barbecue. (Sisters can cook too) Share it and don’t let anyone be top dog –be the chosen chef, unless everyone is fine with that.This is again modeling a sibling team about helping an aging Mom and Dad.

6) It is a party, not a sibling family meeting. If you want to talk about personal issues, make a date in the future to get together with your angry sister/brother.

7) Don’t make this a family meeting where old sibling grudges get hashed out.It is a holiday.

IF you are an ALCA member or GCMCheck out the chapter ” Working With Adult Aging Siblings” by Cathy Cress and Kali C Peterson in  Care Manager’s Working With the Aging Family – for a deeper dive into how to work with midlife siblings around aging parent care. 

Also, you could apply this to any labor day gathering with siblings and just leave out the aging parent issue.

HAVE A HAPPY LABOR DAY

Filed Under: Aging, Aging Life Care, aging life care manager, care manager, Families, Geriatric Care Management Business, Geriatric Care Manager, Holiday Rituals in Aging Family, nurse advocate, nurse care manager, Siblings Tagged With: blood sibling, brother, Care Managers Working with the Aging Family, celebrations with siblings, Democartic party, drinking on labor day, family and politics, family meeting, Labor Day, Labor Day barbecue, mid-life siblings, midlife sibling, Mitt Romney, New Horizon Press, President Obama, sibling, siblings fights over politics, sister, tea party

7 Tips to Make Labor Day Midlife- Sibling Stress Free

September 1, 2017

Dys-fam90264_CH22_FIG02.jpg

 

Happy Labor Day. 

If you are working with midlife siblings to solve elder care issues and they are attending a Labor Day barbecue-  

Here are 

Suggestions to make the ritual of Labor Day –  a holiday to be enjoyed by midlife siblings and their families  – not dreaded like the annual Thanksgiving dinner where Mom burns the turkey and your uncle gets drunk and sings. 

Here are 7 tips to help them keep the Labor Day heartburn free without a midlife sibling to build a midlife sibling team over aging Mom and Dad issues.

1) Don’t discuss politics. In this era of the Trump presidency with so many families at odds over President Trump, Charlotteville, the Russian hacking investigation, DOMA, the building of the ” Mexican Wall ” –politics can be lethal to families. Spare siblings, and guests. This is bloodier than the civil war with so many kin at opposite poles. So keep it positive and light or just plain pass the time of day. And whatever you do, don’t drink too much and forget the ban on politics.

2) Remember that it is a family gathering and it is not “all about you”.Suggest keeping a positive attitude for the sake of aging parents, if they are there,  and  kids, who will model bad sibling behavior when they face parent- care in the future

3) Call email or Facebook, Evite everyone ahead of time. Ask everyone to bring a dish to share. That is the beginning of building a sibling family team- sharing food. Call every midlife sibling and family member. Do not exclude. Again to build a team effort.

4) Attempt to get all midlife siblings to plan activities ahead and jointly work to make them happen-with a sibling team spirit. Think of softball games, horseshoes, and a treasure hunt, anything that everyone can have joint ideas about beforehand. Use Facebook to do this- hopefully, all your siblings are your Facebook friends.

5) Arrange to split the bill for beverages like alcohol and soft drinks, again sibling team effort. Remember to go light on alcohol because, like the recent Houston explosion caused by hurricane flooding, alcohol can detonate sibling warfare.

6) Share jobs- setting up tables, bringing in equipment for sports or games, lawn chairs- especially ‘manning” the barbecue. (Sisters can cook too) Share it and don’t let anyone be top dog –be the chosen chef, unless everyone is fine with that.This is again modeling a sibling team about helping an aging Mom and Dad.

6) It is a party, not a sibling family meeting. If you want to talk about personal issues, make a date in the future to get together with your angry sister/brother.

7) Don’t make this a family meeting where old sibling grudges get hashed out.It is a holiday.

Check out the chapter ” Working With Adult Aging Siblings” by Cathy Cress and Kali C Peterson in  Care Manager’s Working With the Aging Family – for a deeper dive into how to work with midlife siblings around aging parent care. 

Also, you could apply this to any labor day gathering with siblings and just leave out the aging parent issue.

HAVE HAPPY LABOR DAY

Filed Under: Aging, Aging Life Care, aging life care manager, care manager, Families, Geriatric Care Management Business, Geriatric Care Manager, Holiday Rituals in Aging Family, nurse advocate, nurse care manager, Siblings Tagged With: blood sibling, brother, Care Managers Working with the Aging Family, celebrations with siblings, Democartic party, drinking on labor day, family and politics, family meeting, Labor Day, Labor Day barbecue, mid-life siblings, midlife sibling, Mitt Romney, New Horizon Press, President Obama, sibling, siblings fights over politics, sister, tea party

New Addtion to Ten Tips to Make Labor Day With Siblings Stress Free

September 3, 2012

Dys-fam90264_CH22_FIG02.jpg

 

Happy Labor Day. I am going to add to my blog of August 29th Ten Tips to Make Sibling Labor Day Barbecue Stress Free

If your siblings the coming to a Labor Day barbecue, I will revise the list and make new number one, which someone suggested when I posted the original sibling blog.

Make the ritual of Labor Day and events– a holiday to be enjoyed by midlife siblings their families and everyone – not dreaded.

Here is the new tip # 1 to keep the sibling celebration acid reflux free without midlife sibling drama plus make it a midlife sibling team effort to maintain

1) Don’t discuss politics. In this presidential season with so much vitriol over candidates and so many families spit down the middle over whether to support Obama or Romney, tea party of old republicans or democrats, spare you family, siblings and guests. This is bloodier than the civil war with so many families and siblings at opposite poles. So keep it to family and sibling issues or just plain pass the time of day. And whatever you do, don’t drink too much and forget the ban on politics.

And to restate new number 2)

2) Remember that it is a family gathering and it is not all about you. Keep a positive attitude for the sake of your midlife siblings, aging parents, if they are there, your own young kids who will model sibling behavior from you -their parent-

in the way you interact with their aunts and uncles.So avoid politics .

family and sibling unity.

Filed Under: Aging Tagged With: blood sibling, brother, celebrations with siblings, Democartic party, drinking on labor day, family and politics, family meeting, Labor Day barbecue, midlife sibling, Mitt Romney, New Horizon Press, President Obama, sibling, siblings fights over politics, sister, tea party

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