Beware-Countertransference with Dysfunctional Families

August 1, 2023

Dysfunctional families call care managers in the summer. Why? During the summer adult children visit their parents because of national holidays, family reunions, and trips to their parents’ homes or summer houses with entitled seniors. When Dysfunctional family members call you because they are appalled frightened or both as they find their parents have deteriorated or are alone in boiling heat from climate change- beware of countertransference. What’s that? When working with difficult aging families, aging professionals and geriatric care managers experience strong negative feelings and intense reactions this experience is called countertransference where the therapist develops an intense emotional reaction to the patient.

Many health and family professionals come from dysfunctional families themselves. So it is important foraging professionals and geriatric care managers to acknowledge and understand any countertransference reactions to develop an effective strategy for intervention. Which types of emotional reactions might an aging professional experience in dealing with a difficult aging family?

· Intense dislike of family members

· Condescension toward client or family

· Impatience with family decision making

· Arguing with clients or family members

· Avoiding necessary contact with clients or family

· Becoming paternalistic, for example, taking over decisions that should be made by family

· Becoming passive-aggressive, for example, the GCM does not follow through with her own recommendations^.is important that an aging professional working with a dysfunctional family, has 5 years of experience with difficult families, training in family systems, and an education that covers countertransference.

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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 10 Clinical Tools Professionals must learn before they work with these difficult Families.
Learn how to solve dysfunctional family problems after you master these tools.
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Give frantic VIP adult children hope when they desperately.

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Understand the VIP Dysfunctional Aging Family System you must enter to get care for elders!
Understand 11 Warning Signs You Are Working with VIP Dysfunctional Family
Master 10 Clinical Tools from Care Manager Claudia Fine and Emily Salz writing the Professionals must learn before they work with these difficult Families

Learn how to solve dysfunctional family problems after you master these tools.

Get care for aging family members when the dysfunctional family members resist.

Learn how to work with aging parents like Rupert Murdock & Logan Roy Sign Up

The rich “They are not like you and me” said Scott Fitzgerald in The Great Gatsby.

Every family must deal with life’s most important events- birth, marriage, aging, and death. Dealing with aging and the succession of the head of the family is a struggle for all families but it can overwhelming and destructive with the dysfunctional family, marked by strained relationships

10 marketing messages for Adult Kids Who Call 911 GCM Before & After Holidays

November 7, 2022

10 Marketing messages care managers should share with long-distance adult children before and after the holidays

Geriatric Care Managers are wonder women before and after the holidays for long-distance care providers. Share 10 marketing messages when shocked long-distance family members call you, who just spent the holidays with aging parents and freaked out at the decline.

So be prepared with terrific marketing copy and messaging when they call you.

Your copy in an ad or website should include-

“It’s a preventative and prudent idea to have a geriatric care manager in the town where your older relative resides. If there is a crisis, it is cheaper to have a GCM solve it. In an urgent situation, a care manager can go to the hospital or emergency room. This is saner and more cost-effective than you getting on last-minute, expensive flights. You can still go but they can immediately be there to deal with the crisis. They are good insurance.

Even when making marketing visits to 3rd parties like elder law attornies or wealth managers, you can pitch “Before any crisis, the GCM does an initial assessment and visit your long-distance older relative periodically (once a month, once every two months). This is preventative. That way they are there for you when you need them and have all the information to solve the problem.”

10 Marketing messages for long-distance adult children:

“Think of care managers the way you do one of those “blow-up beds.” You can pump them up when you need them in a crisis—actually avoid that crisis, and you yourself can sleep more soundly and with more peace of mind in your own bed.

Some of the things a geriatric care manager can do for long-distance care providers are:

1. Save money by helping keep your parent out of the hospital and you off emergency long-distance flights.

2. Facilitate a family discussion of needs, resources, and division of labor among friends family

3. Recommend ways to proactively prepare and plan for a parent’s possible healthcare crisis.

4. Work on family cooperation to formulate a realistic parent-care plan.

5. Assess the strengths and weaknesses of all of the potential caregivers

6. Help adult siblings resolve conflicts about care decisions.

7. Help siblings act together in the best interest of the parent

8. Decrease the tension between hometown and long-distance siblings

9. Help the long-distance care provider deal with guilt and frustration that may result from their inability to provide more of the day-to-day care.

10. Locate aging resources in your elder parents’ area quickly and without you having to do it.

Learn more about gaining new long-distance care provider clients –this coming holiday season.

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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

Wonder Woman Saves Proactive , Long Distance Aging Family on the Holidays

December 1, 2020

Geriatric care managers are wonder woman for long-distance care providers

More than a million people have died of COVID in the past 7 days , according to the CDC.

This is an important message for care managers to use before the upcoming holidays. Getting on a plane to travel is dangerous for the long-distance care provider in the

highest national spread of COVID. Plus they might carry the deadly infection to their aging parents, the most vulnerable group to die of COVID. This gives these distant caring family members every reason not to see their parents- but what will they then do to keep them safe- Hire a Geriatric Care Manager.

Add This to Your Ad Copy or Website

If You live Long Distance from an aging parent during the COVID spread, it’s a preventative and prudent idea to have a geriatric care manager in the town where your older relative resides. If your parents are sheltering in place, they can make sure they are safe and use tools to prevent the loneliness and isolation that can set in over the holidays. If there is a crisis, like a COVID diagnosis,

they are right there to professionally manage it. In an urgent situation, a care manager can go to the hospital or emergency room. This is saner, safer, and more cost-effective than you getting on last-minute, expensive flights without any social distancing protection for you or your aging parents when you see them. Geriatric Care Managers are good insurance.”

Use Telehealth to Market to 3rd Parties Over the Holiday

You can make marketing visits to 3rd parties through HIPAA-compliant video

conferencing services like elder law attornies or wealth managers. You can pitch “Before any crisis, the GCM do an initial assessment and visit your long-distance older client on a regular basis. This is preventative. That way a professional is there for your client 1-1, when you need them and has a health care background to solve the problem.”

Here is a better line for long-distance adult children:

“Think of care managers the way you do one of those blow-up beds. You can pump them

up when you need them in a crisis—perhaps avoid that crisis, and you yourself can sleep more soundly and with more peace of mind in your own bed.

Some of the things a geriatric care manager can do for long-distance care providers are:

1. Save your worry, fear of COVID, and money by helping keep your parent safe from COVID and out of the hospital and you off dangerous emergency long-distance flights.

2.Help your parents avoid loneliness and isolation by arranging virtual quality of life activities to keep them socially engaged while sheltering in place.

4.Facilitate a family discussion of needs, resources, and division of labor among friends family

5. Recommend ways to proactively prepare and plan for a parent’s possible health care crisis like COVID.

6. Work on family cooperation to formulate a realistic parent-care plan.

7.Assess the strengths and weaknesses of all of the potential caregivers if needed

7. Help adult siblings resolve conflicts, if any, about care decisions.

8. Help the long-distance care provider deal with guilt and frustration that may result from their inability to provide more of the day-to-day care.

9. Locate aging resources in your elder parents’ area quickly and without you having to do it.

Learn more about gaining new long-distance care provider clients -this coming holiday season.

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

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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

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911- My Aging Parents Looked Bad on Holidays

October 22, 2018

“Geriatric care managers are wonder woman for long-distance care providers? ” This is an important message for care managers to use before the upcoming holidays.
Your copy in an ad or website should include-

Even when making marketing visits to 3rd parties like elder law attornies or wealth managers, you can pitch “Before any crisis, the GCM do an initial assessment and visit your long distance older relative periodically (once a month, once every two months).This is preventative. That way they are there for you when you need them and have all the information to solve the problem.”

Here is a better line for long distance adult children:

“Think of care managers the way you do one of those blow-up beds. You can pump them up when you need them in a crisis—perhaps avoid that crisis, and you yourself can sleep more soundly and with more peace of mind in your own bed.

Some of the things a geriatric care manager can do for long distance care providers are:

1. Save you money by helping keep your parent out of the hospital and you off emergency long-distance flights.

2.Facilitate a family discussion of needs, resources, and division of labor among friends family

3. Recommend ways to proactively prepare and plan for a parent’s possible health care crisis.

4. Work on family cooperation to formulate a realistic parent-care plan.

5.Assess the strengths and weaknesses of all of the potential caregivers

6. Help adult siblings resolve conflicts about care decisions.

7. Help siblings act together in the best interest of the parent

8.Decrease the tension between hometown and long distance siblings

9. Help the long-distance care provider deal with guilt and frustration that may result from their inability to provide more of the day-to-day care.

10. Locate aging resources in your elder parents area quickly and without you having to do it.

Learn more about gaining new long-distance care provider clients -this coming holiday season.

Join me in my new Webinar

5 Ways to Tame the Turbulence of Holiday Meltdown in Aging Families

During the busiest season for care management referrals-

You Will Learn:

How to give hope to frantic children who call, after seeing their aging parent struggling with the rituals
How to sell services to desperate adult child callers
How to use GCM tools to contain Holiday chaos
How to use financial forecasting to prepare for growth during the holidays
How to work with both dysfunctional and long-distance families who call during the holidays
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Technology Tools to Help with Reminicsence Over the Holidays

December 17, 2017

Reminiscence isn’t new. Before the printing press, storytellers and bards were how history was recorded- in the new mind not on tape.

Oral storytellers gave us the Odyssey and another valiant tales. History exists in their family, and Ulysses or Penelope might be sitting in their living room this holiday season.

Here are some tips to use if their want to capture these family tales during this holiday season—a perfect time to do this. Use empathetic listening if you can. Make all the messages you are are giving the older person— tone, how fast you speak, how they are sitting- say, “I want to listen to you.”

Ask questions that prompt the story but don’t make judgments. If there are going to record the family tale, do it in a way that doesn’t distract or stop the older person from talking. Recording on your i phone , ipad etc is simple and non-intrusive

Start somewhere. If the elder isn’t going to tell stories on his or her own, start the story and see if they will follow along. “That chair there are sitting in, where did their get it, Mom?” Pick an ornament off the Christmas tree and show it to dad to see if he can tell its story.

Reminiscence is sparked by the senses, and buried memories flow into our brains. That’s why the holidays are a perfect time to have their older family members share stories with them. The sense of taste spurs memories. Just think of making that pie that tasted a lot like their mom’s, a brisket, traditional Christmas pudding, latkes

Here are two technology tools to help you with this legacy building for your older client

Life Bio

Grandma’s Pie

Check out my Book Handbook of Geriatric Care Management with more tools for legacy building written by David Lindeman Director Of the Center for Technology at UC Berkeley and Julie Menack of 21 st Care Solutions

Beware-Countertransference with Dysfunctional Families

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