Wendy Lustbader is a wise woman. If you do not know of her, check out a few of her many books such as, Counting on Kindness a book about becoming dependent on others for help, and What’s Worth Knowing which is a collection of insights gathered from older people.

Wendy Lustbader is a medical social worker. Mental health, quality home and nursing care, and hospital geriatrics are her specialties. Today, she is the Affiliate Associate Professor at the University of Washington School of Social Work and lectures nationally on subjects related to aging.

Wendy writes a blog, and I recently came across a list she posted titled, “Ten Ways Life Gets Better as We Got Older,” adapted from her latest book, Life gets Better: The Unexpected Pleasures of Growing Older.

Post Wendy’s list on your refrigerator or bathroom mirror as a reminder of the many advantages of growing older:

1. Confidence grows. Youth is a time of searching and insecurity, trying to figure out how to live, and as time passes we gather more and more certainty about our own aims and preferences. We become less interested in comparing ourselves to others, having slowly gained an internal compass.

2. Self-knowledge deepens. An expanding awareness of our strengths and vulnerabilities helps us endure difficult times with more equanimity. We are not buffeted around so much by other people’s opinions about the choices we make and what we should do with our lives. It becomes a pleasure to stand our ground in tricky situations, not out of stubborn pride but because we finally know who we are.

3. Get better at relationships. One of the most significant skills gained with age is employing what we have learned about ourselves in how we conduct our relationships. With intimate partners, especially, self-knowledge allows us to be more open about our weaknesses as we try not to repeat the same mistakes we’ve made in the past. We appreciate the loyalty of true friends more and more, having less patience for superficial relationships.

4. Handle decision-making with less frenzy. Gradually, the hard-earned benefits of hindsight start to add up. We see where we went wrong earlier on, allowing our past mistakes to inform our present situation. We can assess the pro’s and con’s of complex choices on the basis of our lived experience, rather than having to guess about the implications of taking one path rather than another.

5. Courage becomes nimble. Having gotten through hard times and come out the other side, we are less afraid of adversity. We know how crucial it is to seize contentment whenever we can find it, rather than standing at the sidelines waiting for the best opportunities. We know that life consists of compromises, mixed with a bit of luck and risk, and there is no time like the present.

6. Become more interested in others. Generosity begins to occupy a central place in how we regard the value of what we do. As the decades pass, we find that we need to contribute to the greater good more than our own self-betterment. We become more sympathetic toward others, having found that we all face the same fundamental predicaments.

7. Spirituality deepens. The search for meaning goes on throughout the lifespan, but in our later years such questions become more urgent and begin to take precedence. Meanwhile, petty concerns recede to their rightful place in the background. Going through bereavement wakes us up to the spiritual domain in a manner that shows us what really matters in life.

8. Become more vivacious. The real action in life is interior. The body slowly deteriorates, but the soul expands. When we are young, we look at elders and cannot see the exciting developments going on inside. The most lively people are those who have death in sight and so are determined to live life to the fullest.

9. See further. The radiance that can often be seen in elders comes from becoming more alive. Once we stop hurrying so much, we develop a quality of attentiveness that adds new dimensions to our experience. It takes time to accept the body’s imperative to slow down, but once we do we are able to access the quadrant of life where ordinary freedoms are cherished.

10. Receptivity to joy widens. Awareness of our mortality conveys immediacy in everything we do. We no longer squander our time, because time is the currency that has become more precious. This is our one and only life, and we recognize this more keenly than ever before.

Thank you, Wendy for this fabulous list!

Family caregivers are awesome. From staying up all night with worry to managing complex day-to-day care, there doesn’t seem to be anything they wouldn’t do to ensure the safety and security of elderly loved ones. Undoubtedly, eldercare is nothing less than a labor of love and hard work — physically and emotionally.

Things being what they are when it comes to caring for aging parents and loved ones, it is beyond my comprehension why a family caregiver would allow their care receiver — be it parent, spouse, partner, or friend  — to get away with making remarks to and about them that are purposefully mean, degrading, and hurtful.

As a long-time family caregiver advocate, I’ve heard it all. “My father calls me names and tells me I’m a terrible daughter.” “Mom says I don’t make enough time for her and won’t accept the fact that I have a family of my own to take care of and support.” “My husband barks orders at me all day long.”

In their moment of tirade, should we cut our elders some slack because they are ill and perhaps in pain? Should we “turn the other cheek” and act as though what is being said to us does not hurt our feelings?  I say absolutely not.  There is no excuse for bad behavior on the part of the elderly people we care for. NO ONE in the caregiving role deserves to be treated unkindly at any time, for any reason.

In my book, The Complete Eldercare Planner (Random House, 2009, Updated and Revised), I describe in detail how eldercare can leave deep emotional scars when care receivers lash out at people who are caring for them and when the experience of family caregiving is consistently unrewarding and negative. Sons, daughters, spouses, partners, and friends know all too well about the volatile environment of eldercare and how quickly emotions can get out of hand.

If you are a family caregiver and your elder is verbally abusive, I offer action steps as a way to to help end the vicious cycle of being on the receiving end of mean and nasty comments. Integrating self-respecting strategies in the family caregiving process starts right now.

Get angry.

Self-respecting family caregivers get angry. They admit to themselves that they are angry. And they acknowledge the right to be angry. Self-respecting caregivers express their anger in the moment and do so in a way that teaches others how to treat them. Suffering in silence implies consent for others to treat us badly.

Practice the following statements in front of the mirror. The more you say them, the more you’ll believe that what you are saying is true. Next time you are angry with your elder say these words to them:

“What you just did (said) makes me angry. I do not deserve that.”

“It makes me angry when you… Please stop it now.”

“My bedroom is private, and it makes me angry when you walk in without knocking.” “We’re all adults here, and your criticism is not appropriate.”

Don’t take it personally.

Self-respecting caregivers allow care receivers to be angry and they don’t take what is being said personally (this takes practice). When our elders are lashing out at us, more often than not underlying issues are at work: elders may be in pain (physically and emotionally); elders may be frustrated (their bodies are failing them); elders may be depressed (losses of all kinds surround them); and elders are acting out (long-time family conflicts remain unresolved).

The next time your elders start complaining; look them straight in the eye. Allow them a few moments for them to express their anger. Don’t defend; don’t interrupt; let them vent. When they are finished, you can help to defuse their highly charged emotions by saying something like, “I’m sorry this is making you so angry.”

If they say they are angry about something you said or did, you can defuse that situation too by asking for forgiveness. I know this suggestion sounds strange; but keep in mind their anger is not really about you. Asking for forgiveness is not an admission of guilt; it can be an effective way to calm the waters in the moment. “I’m really sorry I disappointed you.” “I know you’re upset (angry), and I’m sorry.”

Set boundaries.

Self-respecting caregivers set boundaries. Verbally abusive people pick on certain people because they are easy targets. Don’t make yourself available. There is no disgrace in walking out of a situation that is intolerable or beyond your power to handle; in fact, it is the smart thing to do when you recognize your own limitations. Simply say, “I’m leaving now,” and walk out of the room. Nothing more needs to be said.

Ultimately, we cannot change the basic personalities of people who are mean and nasty. We can only make our best attempts to manage ourselves in the moment. Never ever forget that family caregivers are special and you deserve to be treated as such.

I hope that you have found some of these tips to be helpful. I wish you well.

Let’s say Mom and Dad have decided to move into a retirement community or move closer to you, and now they want you to handle the process of selling their home. Where do you start? Worse yet, what if you don’t live anywhere near your parents? How do you accomplish this important task from long distance?

I was a long distance family caregiver living in Chicago when Mom called me from Florida. She said her husband, Bill was not well and they are ready to move back home.  I was put in charge of helping her find a real estate agent – with no time to spare. The house had to sell fast – not an easy feat in the Florida housing market. Good news is the house sold in one week – thanks to hiring the right real estate agent.

Here are a few tips from my book, The Complete Eldercare Planner (Random House, 2009, Updated and Revised)  if you are now in charge of getting the house sold.

For starters, make sure the real estate agents that you are considering meet the following criteria:

• they are full-time real estate agents (no part-timers)
• they have achieved the highest sales ranking within their company
• they proven sales records (you can find this information online). You only want to work with the best.

Once you narrow down your search to the top three agents, conduct a Google background check on each of them. What are others saying about them? Do they have an excellent reputation?

Next step is to call the top three on your list and interview them over the phone. Did they call you back promptly if you left a voice message? Did they listen as you spoke about your situation? Did you like what you heard?

If the answer to these questions is “yes” then give your parents the contact information of your top three agents and ask them to interview each of them over the phone as well.  If they have a “good feeling” about the agents then it’s time to invite them to the house for an in-person interview.

There are more specific questions to ask agents in the interview process. You’ll find a complete list of questions online on my website (www.elderindustry.com). Go to the “Downloads” tab and scroll down to the Chapter 9 Housing chapter.

In the meantime, here are a few questions to get you started.

How many homes in this area have you sold in the past two years?

What is your track record for average number of days on market?

The right real estate agent should also have excellent marketing skills. Ask the agents what their strategy will be to sell the house. Also ask if they have a website. These days many houses are sold over the Internet.

Finally, if you are a long-distance family caregiver and you are trying to accomplish the goal of getting your parents’ house sold from far away, perhaps the most important question you can ask yourself is this…

Do I sincerely believe that this particular real estate agent will become almost a “family member” to Mom and Dad? Will he/she be willing to go far beyond the call of duty to help them and me during this process?

After you choose the real estate agent, there are a few very important tasks that you need to complete in order to get the house sold.

1. Make sure your parents can locate the title to the house and any other house-sale related legal documents.
2. If your parents are co-owners on the house, make sure each of them has established a separate Power of Attorney in the event of incapacity during the house-sale process. THIS IS CRITICAL. Make sure you have copies of the POA documents.

I wish you well.

I finally got my message across to Mom – but it wasn’t easy.  In a nutshell, Mom told me flat out she wanted the “independence” of going to the ATM machine herself to withdraw cash.  The ATM machine in our Chicago neighborhood is located inside the nearby Walgreen’s. It’s a very busy city scene – lots of people both locals and tourists in and out all day long. I explained to Mom how she was an easy target for anyone who wants to rob her once she leaves the store. My 86 year-old, 100 pound, 4’ 10” mother laughed at me.

For several months she dug in her heels and insisted on wanting her independence when it came to withdrawing cash. I was not getting through to her and so I finally had to say, “If independence is what you are looking for to get cash then you will have 100% responsibility of managing the entire banking process which also includes going to the bank, opening an account for cash withdrawal purposes, and then keeping that account filled with funds. OK?” She said OK. And I held my breath.

The easy part was Mom setting up the account with her banker. She was proud of herself and told me so. In the meantime I waited for the inevitable to happen. Several weeks later she went to the local ATM machine to withdraw money and she could not understand why it did not work for her. Thank goodness she did not ask a nearby stranger to help her.!!!!

The reason it did not work was because Mom did not fully understand the connection between the bank account and the ATM machine. And that’s when she finally realized she was in over her head and her highly guarded “independence” when it came to the ATM machine came to a screeching halt. She came home with tears in her eyes and apologized.

We are now back to the way it was… if Mom needs cash, we both walk over to the bank together and she does her thing.

Stay tuned for more adventures of Joy and her Mom.

If you are in the same boat as me (struggling with an elderly person who refuses move), take a look at my blogs 1 through 8 titled, “Moving a Reluctant Parent.” As you read along, pay particular attention to my attitude and communication strategies that I have employed along the way. My journey with my Aunt who refuses to move is now over two years and counting, and what I knew would eventually happen, is now happening.

Over the years I have mentally collected clear cut evidence that Aunt Bernice would be better off living somewhere else. Ever since the day she and I started talking about her move, things are taken a turn for the worse; she is having difficulties negotiating two flights of stairs; she is experiencing injuries due to a senior-unfriendly environment; she is finding out that her sons are not as readily accessible to help her when she needs it; her elderly neighbors are dying and moving away; she is spending money she is financially strapped and having difficulty keeping up with her mortgage and major interior and exterior repairs; she is experiencing chronic health issues; she is not sleeping at night because she is consumed with worries; and she is physically exhausted trying to do the actual work of maintaining the interior and exterior of the house.

In spite of the evidence, my Aunt’s response to everything that is happening around her and to her is, “That’s life.”

And so I take a deep breath, and make yet another attempt to see this situation form my Aunt’s point of view.  What am I not seeing that Aunt Bernice is seeing? How is it that we can look at this situation from polar opposites and both be right?

Once again, the necessity for me to switch gears is essential if I want to have any kind of relationship with my Aunt. If I want to be right (whatever that is) and insist that she move now, I will lose her. If I want to learn something here and now and be a better person for it in the long run then I will take another deep breath, say a prayer, and begin to figure out how to take conversations with my Aunt in an entirely different (and more emotionally difficult) direction.

The act of moving is relatively simple process. Look around. Toss, give away, or keep. Pack boxes. Put stuff in a moving van or storage. Unpack. You’re done. Is this what my Aunt is resisting? Of course not. What’s at stake here is the necessity to my Aunt to face deep seated emotional issues head on as they relate to through independence to interdependence and the death of times gone by.

For the past several months I have purposefully not said one word moving. Instead, I have stayed in closer contact and have let her do all the talking.  If she brought up the subject of moving, then I chimed in. If not, I listened for clues as to what is going on in her world. As hard as it has been for me to keep my mouth shut, this has proven to be an excellent strategy. The trust (and love) level between us remains high.

Truth is, my Aunt is not going to move anywhere until and unless she has dealt with the realities of old age and her realistic ability to remain in her own home, living alone.  I’ve said this time and time again… my staying 100% respectful of her  decision-making process and keeping the trust level high is eventually going to get me the results I am looking for – a smooth move transition.

Relatively few specialist services exist for younger people with dementia. Depending on where one resides, a person may be referred to a psychiatrist, a geriatrician, a neurologist and/or various combinations of health professionals. Additionally, specialist groups like the Alzheimer’s Association campaign for better services and provide support and advice for young men and women with Alzheimer’s disease and dementia.

Undoubtedly, the newly diagnosed are pioneers and traveling in unknown territory. Singer, Glen Campbell, championship coach, Pat Summitt, author, Michael Ellenbogen and millions of others need our help and they need it now. Today, there is no cure and no known way to slow its progression. Worse yet, the disease can easily bankrupt our health system if we do not get involved and act now.

How we can be helpful at this time is to get educated; learning what we can and supporting research efforts is a good start.  Also, look to politicians to amend the Social Security Act to provide for Medicare coverage of comprehensive Alzheimer’s disease and other dementia diagnosis and services in order to improve care and outcomes for Americans living with Alzheimer’s disease.

September is World Dementia Awareness Month. From 2012, national Alzheimer associations, people with dementia and advocates across the world will join together by raising awareness of dementia in their own country throughout September. A range of activities will take place in all regions of the world, with events such as Memory Walks, awareness-raising concerts, enjoyable events for people with dementia and their caregivers, and informative sessions both for the general public and for health care professionals. World Dementia Awareness Month developed, due to popular demand, out of World Alzheimer’s Day, which takes place every year on 21 September.

My two elderly friends, Martha and Mary are legally blind, and I am in constant awe of the many ways they negotiate their way through everyday life without a hitch.

Martha developed Retinitis pigmentosa in her early 40’s. Mary has been blind since birth. And when it comes to these two women NOTHING has ever gotten in their way when it comes to working, cooking, cleaning the house, getting around, making friends, dating, and volunteering. You name it, they do it – just like you and me.

Martha and Mary’s  courage to do what it takes to live full out in a sightless world is awesome, and watching them in action is a constant reminder of their willingness to stay current on products and services in order to succeed in life. On top of that, Mary and Martha also have no difficulty whatsoever asking others for help. They both have zillions of friends who are there for them at a drop of a hat. They developed the courage to ask for help early on… and today it is paying off big time.

Which leads me to tell you about a computer tool and a wonderful organization that can positively change the life of someone you know that is visually impaired – CDesk and Foundation Fighting Blindness.

CDesk is an easy-to-use all inclusive software/hardware solution for older adults who are visually impaired. Randyce Wechter, president of Adaptive Voice, developed CDesk as a result of being blind for five years. After regaining sight in one eye, she was determined to create a product that allowed sightless people the ability to remain fully functioning on the computer.

With CDesk, anyone who is visually impaired can create word documents (with built-in spell checker), manage contacts, access email and convert HTML to TEXT, translate languages, open attachments, browse the Internet, scan documents, create spreadsheets, access calendars and make appointments, play games, and SKYPE. Undoubtedly, Randyce has demonstrated a true understanding of the challenges faced by the visually impaired, and she has paid attention to the smallest details which is what makes CDesk a useful program.

You may also have an interest in learning more about Foundation Fighting Blindness.  Since its founding in 1971, the Foundation Fighting Blindness organization has been dedicated to funding innovative research to find preventions, treatments, and cures for inherited retinal degenerative diseases that lead to blindness and affect more than 10 million people in the United States.

Retinitis pigmentosa and Usher syndrome are inherited diseases commonly diagnosed during childhood or young adulthood. RP causes severe vision loss leading to legal and/or complete blindness. Children with Usher syndrome are born with varying degrees of deafness and later develop RP.

Age-related macular degeneration has inherited risks and is characterized by a progressive loss of central vision. AMD is the leading cause of blindness in adults over age 55 in the U.S. and other developed countries.

The Foundation provides information and outreach programs for patients, families and professionals. To date, the Foundation has raised more than $425 million. The more we know about retinal degenerative diseases, the better we can find cures to stop it.

FOUNDATION FIGHTING BLINDNESS
7168 Columbia Gateway Drive, Suite 100

Columbia, MD 21046
Toll-free: 1-800-683-5555

www.FightBlindness.org

Dakim. Just hearing that funny-sounding word makes me happy. Why? Because of the world of good their brain-fitness product is doing to help my Mom age successfully. Every day, she sits at her computer for 20 minutes or so, exercising her brain with the Dakim Brain Fitness program I installed on her laptop.

The wonderful people who created Dakim brain fitness programs have taught me a lot about brain fitness over the years. One important lesson has to do with teaching me the difference between brain fitness games and brain fitness exercises. Who knew?

Mind games like Bananagrams and Kanoodle zone in on a single cognitive function much like doing a series of push-ups in order to strengthen upper arms – repeating the same activity over and over again works the same muscle. Brain fitness exercises, on the other hand offer a structured system of brain work outs that are specifically designed to affect a wide range of cognitive areas.

Here’s where we come to the fork in the road when it comes to a commitment to long-term brain health.

Casual brain-gaming requires little effort. Pick up a crossword puzzle and work the words. Brain games are cheap, quick and easy. Play on impulse and game over. And, since individual brain games tend to be limited in scope, the amusement of it all may be short-lived. This is what professionals in the field refer to as “brain teasers.”

A daily commitment to brain health and related brain-health exercises offers greater rewards than playing mind games (same holds true regarding a commitment to a daily physical-fitness routine). Improvements in memory and protection against the effects of age-related cognitive decline is what it’s all about, and structured brain fitness programs such as Dakim are available for anyone who is serious about maintaining his or her brain health.

Until now, I never really gave much consideration to brain games vs. brain exercise. I thought they were pretty much the same. And now I know that’s not the case at all.

Get serious about protecting your brain health and the brain health of an elderly loved one and invest in a proven brain fitness exercise program that works. I highly recommend Dakim as a comprehensive clinically tested brain fitness exercise program. It’s great fun, too.

To find out more about Dakim, visit the Joy Loverde’s website “Recommended Resources” page, and click on the Dakim logo… http://www.elderindustry.com/resources.html