Cathy Cress

Expert in Aging Life and Geriatric Care Management

  • Home
  • Products
    • Speakers Bureau Package
    • GCM Manual New 5th Edition
    • VIP Care Management White Paper
    • Books
    • Geriatric Care Management – 4th Edition
    • Mom Loves You Best
    • Care Managers
  • Online Classes
    • GCM Operations Manual Online Course
    • Geriatric Care Management Business Online Course
    • CEUs for Individual Modules
  • Webinars
    • Upcoming Webinars
    • Past Webinars
  • Recommendations
  • About
  • Blog
    • Aging
    • Geriatric Care Manager
    • Siblings
    • Webinar
  • Contact

How Storytelling at Thanksgiving Can Give Elders A Happier Family Holiday

November 22, 2022

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

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

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 oral history for elders 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 and use reminiscence for elders by asking 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 stories.

Oral history for elders 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 stories 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 storytelling 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 parent’s 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 higher 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.

Story Telling at Thanksgiving  with Story Worth

Another great idea to capture reminiscence for elders is giving them StoryWorth. 

 

My daughter sent this gift to 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, an oral history of an elder father 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, really enjoyed writing about his past and the prompts have brought many vivid memories back to him.

Sweet grandmother holding a beautifully cooked turkey dinner.

 

Filed Under: Aging, Aging Family, Aging Life Care, aging life care manager, Benefits of Reminiscence, Black Aging Family, black care manager, black concieirge nurse, black concierge care manager, black concierge RN, Black Entrepreneur, Black Entrepreneur RB, Black Entrepreneur RN, Black entrepreneurs, Black Geriatric Care Manager, Black geriatric care managers, Black RN, black RN care manager, black social worker, black travel nurse, Black Travel Nurses, Black Travel RN, care management business, care manager, caregiver coaching, CAREGIVER RESOUCES, case manager, Clinical Tools Dysfunctional families, Concierge aging clients, Coronavirus safety elders, COVID -19 Safety, COVID & HOLIDAY SEASON, Covid 19 Webinar, Dementia Activities, Dysfunctional Family & Holidays, Dysfunctional Family Inquiry, elder care manager, Elder Reminicence on Thanksgiving, Emotional Quality of Life, Families, geriatric care manager, geriatric social worker, Holiday Rituals in Aging Family, Long Distance Safety Travel COVID, Long Distance travel Holidays, New Years, nurse advocate, nurse care manager, Oral History, Quality of Life, quality of life -COVID-19, Quality of Life and Reminicance, Quality of Life and Thanksgiving, Quality of Life for elders, quality of life in senior centers, Quality of Life with Dementia, Reminicence on Thanksgiving, Reminicence with elders, Reminiscence Therapy, Remote Thanksgiving Family Visit, Thanksgiving, Thanksgiving Parent crisis, Thanksgiving Safe Visits to Grandma, Thanksgiving with COVID, Thanksgving visits during COVID, Therapist Specializing in Aging, Webinar Tagged With: aging family, aging family Thanksgiving, aging life care manager, aging parent, aging parent care, aging parent Thanksgiving, aging technology, ancrestory.com, assessing for quality of life, black aging family, black american geriatric care managers, black american social workers, Black caregivers, Black Entrepreneurs, Black Heirlooms, Black Nurse Entrepreneurs, Black RN's, Black start-up geriatric care management, Black travel nurses, care manager, care plan, care plan interventions, case manager, COVID THANKSGIVING VISIT, COVID VIRTUAL THANKSGIVING VISIT, 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, Thanksgiving Webinar, Thanksgiving with dysfunctional family, Thanksgiving with midlife siblings, You Tube, You Tube and storytelling

How Can Someone with Dementia Have a Better Quality of Life on a Holiday ?

April 2, 2021

 

Reminiscence and Story Telling

 

This Easter holiday is the perfect occasion to engage elders with dementia. The role of storytelling and reminiscence is very important for elders, as they look back on their life and holidays bring strong long-term memories. It gives them a chance to socialize as they tell their story. It also means someone usually listens or documents. That magically gives the elder social interaction and connectedness. So many Easter rituals can prompt stories for elders with some level of dementia. The ritual of dying easter eggs, finding easter baskets on Easter morning, dressing up for the local Easter Parade, eating ritual foods at Easter dinner or at Easter Brunch. Whether the older person is actually participating or watching, these rituals can prompt stories from their long-term memory.

 

Elders sharing stories means passing on history.

This gives the older person a chance to give the larger picture of their life and family history to children and grandchildren or extended family, who may have not heard all the details of their grandparents or parents’ life before- what they cooked, what they did on holidays like Easter. So the quality of the older person of both the older person and the aging family is increased through oral history and reminiscence

The aging professional can suggest family or friends just sitting down and prompting a story or oral history using  technology like your phone

Even elders with Alzheimer’s can find new joy with Reminiscence

When an elderly person develops Alzheimer’s or other forms of dementia, the short-term memory is frequently affected but long-term memories can remain as intact and vivid as they have always been during the course of the patient’s life. As a result, a family can use a practice called reminiscence therapy to help combat the frustration, confusion, and depression that can often accompany dementia and even bring joy to the older person

What is reminiscence therapy?

 Reminiscence therapy is like a therapy session where the elderly person will spend time recalling memories of his or her life, perhaps telling stories about things that happened and events the person can recall.

Sometimes senior experts or family members can use photos, familiar objects, or other such things to help jog the memory of the patient. Some therapists and family members can a scrapbook of a person’s life, including photos, letters, and other such personal memorabilia. This becomes a visual biography of the patient’s life and helps the older person remember who he or she is.

How does this quality of life therapy help? Almost all elderly men and women can start feeling discouraged and frustrated with their memory issues. Reminiscence can give peace and acceptance of the current situation by helping the person remember that he or she has had a good and full life. It also prompts communication skills of elderly people who otherwise may not feel very compelled to open up and share anything with anyone else.

Dementia and Reminiscence of Easter

So this Easter holiday try reminiscence. People with dementia can receive a richer quality of life when people actually listen to them. They feel as their thoughts and feelings actually matter. For anyone who has an elderly loved one suffering from dementia, this benefit alone can make reminiscence therapy a form of joy for a very confused elder. So when you dye Easter eggs, create easter baskets, do an Easter egg hunt, serve an Easter brunch or dinner, get them involved, let them watch, allow them to help if possible, serve them ritual food or to taste it and ask when how they experienced these rituals, when they were young. If you have old albums of pictures from their childhood of them at Easter, look and the photos with them. Then listen.

Reach Cathy in Social Media

Social media links

YouTube channel:https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCaoHdozwS0RvKD

Social media links

YouTube channel:  Website: https://cathycress.com/

 

Blog: https://www.cathycress.com/blog/

Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/pages/category/Gerontologist/Cathy-Cress-MSW-633836950007072/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/cathyjocress

Email: cressgcm@got.net

 

 

  •  

Filed Under: Adult children, Aging, Aging Family, Aging Life Care, Aging Life Care Assocaition, aging life care manager, Dementia, Dementia & Holidays, Easter, Easter and Reminiscence, Easter Rituals, Emotional Quality of Life, Families, GCM Working With Aging Family, Geriatric Care Management Business, Geriatric Care Manager, geriatric care manager, Good Death, Holiday Rituals in Aging Family, nurse advocate, nurse care manager, Quality of Life on Easter Holiday, Quality of Life with Dementia, Reminiscence Therapy, Spiritual Quality of Life Tagged With: aging family, aging parent, aging parent care, aging technology, ancrestory.com, assessing for quality of life, care plan, care plan interventions, family caregivers, Family Caregivers using technology, flip video, genealogy, geriatric care management, geriatric care manager, geritaric care manager, grandfather, grandmothers, grandparents, increasing quality of life, LCSW, 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, Reminiscence and 4th of Jul;y, Reminiscence and Dementia, Reminiscence on the Holidays, storytelling and elders, technology for caregivers, You Tube, You Tube and storytelling

4 Reminicence Holiday Activities for Dementia Using the Four Senses

December 10, 2019

 

Looking for dementia activities?

Reminiscence activities provide a way for caregivers or care managers of people with dementia to learn more about them as individuals and begin to see them beyond dementia. Compared to different activities like music, reading, task-oriented, activities that increase live social interaction with the senses have the most impact on effect in persons with dementia.

Reminiscence therapy is a treatment that uses all the senses — sight, touch, taste, smell, and sound — to help people with dementia remember events, people and places from their past lives. As part of the therapy, caregiver or care managers may use objects in various activities to help individuals with a recall of memories. This can give seniors with dementia a feeling of success and confidence because they are still able to recall and have success with some activities.

Reminiscence therapy can include simple activities, such as conversation, as well as more advanced clinical therapies to help bring memories from the distant past into present awareness. Storytelling about past events they recall through the senses can help people with dementia feel less isolated and more connected to the present, experts say.

 

Some activities the can activate memory in different parts of the brain and help individuals with dementia to reminisce

  1. Looking through photos and keepsakes of prior holidays. Photographs are keepsakes because they bring back memories that help individuals recall- the place where the photo was taken, who was there, even the occasion where the photo was taken. The visual stimulates the part of the brain that holds that memory. Getting out old albums or high school yearbooks and looking at them with the person who has dementia can stimulate good feelings and a time when they were happy and safe.
  2. Listen to their favorite Hanaukka or Christmas music. Music memory and emotion are located in the brain right behind our forehead and are the last parts of the brain to atrophy. That’s why reminiscence is recommended with even the most advanced cases of dementia. If you do a quality of life assessment and find music as a form of joy in a person ‘s life, you can bring tambourines’ shakers or bells or use headphones that play their favorite music. Alive Inside is a famous example of this.
  3. Smell different scents and taste favorite foods. Our sense of smell is embedded in our brain next to memory. So some activities that might work with elders with dementia are making scent cards or  bringing scent bringing their favorite food to taste  like Hanukka Cookies decored holiday Christmas tree cupcakes  have them help prepare simple recipes
  4. Touch is another sense that evokes reminiscence is all of us but is really helpful with Dementia. Knitting, sewing or other crafts in a quality of life assessment show a past skill. Just touching yarn or fabric can bring back memory A walk in the woods or the beach or bringing them to the client with dementia, with a shell from the shore sand, seaweed or keep, bark from a tree, pine needles, pine cones can replicate the touch of these places  

Filed Under: Aging, Aging Family, Aging Life Care, aging life care manager, Blog, care manager, caregiver, Dementia Activities, Geriatric Care Management Business, Geriatric Care Manager, geriatric social worker, nurse advocate, nurse care manager, Oral History, Quality of Life, Quality of Life for elders, Quality of Life with Dementia, Reminiscence Therapy Tagged With: aging family, aging life care manager, aging parent care, assessing for quality of life, care manager, case manager, Dementia Activities, Dementia Quality of Life, emotional quality of life, Four senses dementia activities, nurse advocate, quality of life assessment, Reminicence and Dementia, reminicence and elder, Reminicence and geriatric care manager, Reminicence Therapy, reminin, Reminiscence and Dementia, reminiscence technology

How Storytelling Can Give Elders A Happier Family Thanksgiving

November 1, 2019

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 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. So a dual dose of quality of the older person of 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.

SIGN UP FOR MY NEWEST FREE WEBINAR. 

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

THIS FREE  WEBINAR IS NOVEMBER 21, 2019 FROM 2 PM – 3 PM PST

 

Learn how!

  • 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
  • Sidestep the Many Care Managers Who Do not know how to work with Dysfunctional Aging Families so the  client choose you

 

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, 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 for elders, Reminiscence Therapy, Thanksgiving, 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 Do You Create Emotional Quality of Life in Homebound Seniors?

August 14, 2019

ChiCheng_hmpgHdr.jpgimages_20150325-153531_1.jpg

Homebound seniors are miserably isolated and lonely with a devastating emotional quality of life.

 AARP has estimated the there are 19.6 million in the US. This can be deadly to their quality of life. There are many answers  new approaches throughout the US. One is called Virtual Senior Centers. These game-changing idea magically allow older people, who cannot get out, to use technology or the phone to enhance their emotional and physical quality of life. This is a brilliant idea
Senior Center Without Walls, another approach has been around since 2004. Each week, homebound seniors can access ,over 70 groups by phone or online, all from the comfort of home. Nancy Lynn Jarvis a mystery writer living in Santa Cruz reads each of her mysteries, as they are published live on the telephone to an entire group of homebound seniors in the San Francisco Bay area. Isolated seniors can access a wide breadth of fun and games the isolated seniors can find- just by joining

The Virtual Senior Center really opens up the world for homebound senior enhancing their emotional and intellectual quality of life. It also elevates the quality of life of the caregiver because it gives them a respite and the comfort that their loved one is experiencing a program that offers joy- the joy that comes from joining a community, making new friends and learning new things you choose to be part of, an amazing benefit for homebound seniors.

We’re Still Here an art exhibit is presently in Santa Cruz California and will travel to other museums in the state, addresses the plight of lonely and isolated seniors . Art and community organizing about the lives of lonely seniors are the thrust of this exhibit , for the  the 70,000 visitors  expected to attend this year in its run from April to September. They can to pick cards that offer one lonely senior a visit, a ride a chances to interact with a visitor. This exhibit will travel counties throughout California through other art museums, spreading the message that lonely isolated seniors need help- all through art. The exhibit was spearheaded by Nina Simon  who is now world famous museum director and author who builds and teaches  community driven museums.

Quality Of Life in Geriatric Care Agencies

Sage Eldercare Solutions a geriatric care management agency is Millbrae , California, developed a brilliant program , called  Hummingbird designed by Nina Herndon a geriatric care manager with a passion for quality of life for seniors.The innovative idea  engages clients through one-on-one activity sessions, carefully planned outings, and individualized Therapeutic Activity Kits that can be used by family members, care providers, and other care team members at any time to engage clients in a range of meaningful and stimulating activities. Sessions might include memory or sensory games, memoir writing, armchair travel, gardening, creating art or crafts, or special outings to a place connected with a client’s past or special interests.

Lifespan a 35 year old  geriatric care agency in Santa Cruz, California recently opened their Well- Being program , another quality of life program that which encourages activities to enhance emotional, physical, intellectual and spiritual quality of life for seniors living in the community. Through a Well-Being Assessment of functional, psychosocial and general quality of life, a professional Lifespan Care Manager will identify areas that may promote the older person’s sense of well-being

If you are a geriatric care manager and  think of adding a quality of life program that can enhance not just quality of care but the joy you give isolated seniors in your community, check out the quality of life  Concierge Companion service included in my Geriatric Care Operations Manual

 

Filed Under: Aging, Aging Life Care, Aging Life Care Assocaition, aging life care manager, care manager, case manager, Dementia and Spirituality, Emotional Quality of Life, Families, Geriatric Care Management Business, geriatric care manager, Geriatric Care Manager, geriatric social worker, nurse advocate, nurse care manager, Quality of Life, Quality of Life for elders, Reminiscence Therapy Tagged With: aging life care manager, aging parent, aging technology, ALCA, assessing for quality of life, care plan, elders emotional quality of life, Formal Supports of an older person, Functional Assessment, geraitric assessment, geriatric care management, geriatric care manager, geriatric social worker, increasing quality of life, isolation and quality of life, National Assocaition of Geraitric Care Managers, New Old Age, nurse care manager, parent care, psychosocial assessment- social connections, quality of life and geriatric care management, quality of life and technology, quality of life assessment, senior centers, virtual senior centers

  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • …
  • 6
  • Next Page »

Contact

Use the form on the
Contact page to email Cathy.

Email

Latest trending news

Connect with Cathy

Get Cathy’s “10 Critical Success Steps to a Profitable Aging Life or GCM Business”

  • Home
  • GCM Manual New 5th Edition
  • Books »
  • Services »
  • About
  • Recommendations
  • Blog »
  • Contact

Copyright © 2012–2023 CressGCMConsult & Cathy Cress - Expert in Aging Life and Geriatric Care Management | Developed by wpcustomify