Thanksgiving is around the corner and it will have care manager’s cell phones buzzing with desperate dysfunctional aging family members calling.
The ordinary aging processes, like family rituals, are made far tougher when a family has a history of dysfunction. Aging professionals, like aging life or geriatric care managers, have their greatest challenges in working with these “difficult” families.
Dysfunctional families are not able to organize themselves effectively in the face of eldercare challenges and crises. Every holiday becomes a new crisis. They often can’t even cook the turkey or often an aging Mom just burns it. These families are under more stress as they move from long-established roles into uncharted territory.
What if they “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.
Now that Thanksgiving marching towards us and families are making plans– they have the same attitude about attending the family Thanksgiving dinner.
Here are 3 things you can do as a care manager to help aging clients and their kids avoid acid reflux and burnt turkeys
1. Read Lynn Lynn Hackstaff’s chapter, Difficult Families: Conflict, Dependence, and Mutuality: Care Management with the Difficult Aging Family in the new Handbook of Geriatric Care Management 4th edition
2. Watch my YouTube channel Geriatric Care 1 and subscribe
3. 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
• Sign Up or Find out more
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