How To Get Your Aging Parent To Accept Help

I have been practicing as an Aging Life Care Manager for almost 20 years and have been asked this question at least 100 times. I frequently here, “we really see the usefulness and benefit of your service, but how can we convince our parents to let you in”? My response is typically, “Every situation is different, and you really know your parents better than I do, so here is some general advice.”

1.Observe and LISTEN:

People are more likely to take advice from those who listen to them. Are you really hearing what your aging parent has to say? Regular conversations can build trust. Your loved one will appreciate the fact that you’ve taken an interest in the things that matter to him/her.

Before jumping in with suggestions, take the time to observe your parent. What are they still capable of doing? What do they have trouble with? How do they think of themselves? Knowing these strengths and weaknesses and which of these are tied to their identity can help you figure out an approach to take in suggesting services from an Aging Life Care Manager. An Aging Life Care Manager will analyze this on their assessment, develop a customized plan of care that maximize the strengths of the person and offer suggestions to address the trouble areas that match each individual person.

Have the person who is the best communicator, listener and most influential to have this discussion with your parent. Most families will know who this person is. This could be the oldest male in the family, the youngest daughter, a doctor, an attorney, a friend who has used our service – every family is different but tapping the most influential person is a good source to move forward.

2. Choose your words carefully:

Appeal to the values that matter most to your parent and stress your desire to enable them to maintain and enjoy what independence they still have. Aging Life Care Managers increase the older persons autonomy. We always have the best interest of the client in mind with all our suggestions/recommendations.

Avoid emphasizing your loved one’s weaknesses and forbidding them from doing things. Each person places different value on qualities like respect, self-reliance and a sense of purpose

The refusal of the aging parent to accept help is typically based in fear: no one want to lose control over one’s life. Hiring an Aging Life Care Manager could be perceived as the beginning of loss of control; it actually increases the amount of autonomy a parent has.

Just about every adult child tries to use logical means to get an aging parent to change; it just doesn’t work unless there is a crisis. Don’t wait for a crisis!

Consider the approach of asking the parent to do this for you. You don’t have the time, cannot afford to be away from work, live too far away, have children to care for, etc. Most parents do not want to burden their children.

Your best course of action might be to tell your parent how their refusal is affecting you personally. Let them know how it would make you feel if she/he accepted the service of an Aging Life Care Manager. Would it give you peace of mind? Would you be more relaxed during the workday? Why not express these feelings?

Older adults with dementia are another story, though. Since they are often incapable of acknowledging the true extent of their cognitive and physical decline. It often falls to the Medical Power of attorney to make this decision, to ensuring their health, safety and quality of life.

In Summary:

Be sensitive to the fears and insecurities that are causing your parent’s resistance. Once you understand your parent’s motivations, you can frame your suggestion for an Aging Life Care Manager service in a way that’s more likely to lead to productive discussion. Losing a bit of independence by getting help from others doesn’t have to equate with becoming a devalued and marginalized member of society. Everybody ages; you can’t stop that. But what Aging :Life Care Managers can and adult children can do is respond to someone’s limitations in a way that preserves dignity and value

You can be confident that once we are in the door, meet with them and they sense our sincerity, expertise and customized approach helping them to become more independent, this becomes the least of your worries.

You can contact Holistic Aging @ 412-486-6677 or info@holisticaging.com for Aging Life Care Management services in and around Pittsburgh, PA

Posted in Aging and tagged Aging, help

Holistic Aging - Options for Elder Care

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Lori Wynn

17:57 10 Jan 21

As a physical therapist over the last year, I have worked with some of the clients of Holistic Aging. The clients are... accompanied by the excellent caregivers of Holistic Aging to their appointments. I have spent a good amount of time witnessing the way that these caregivers attend to their clients. The clients are treated by the staff like they are family. The details of their lives are well known and their well-being is top priority. On numerous occasions, I have needed to communicate with the staff, and this is always seamless. If I had family in need of elder care, I would be eager to have one of these exceptionally caring staff of Holistic Aging be a part of the team.read more

Julie Densmore

19:52 10 Aug 20

The Best Medical Investment and Care Decision Our Family Has MadeI highly recommend Holistic Aging for their Life Care... Manager support of an aging loved one who may be living in the Pittsburgh area. Bobbi and her team of qualified individuals are compassionate and trained in geriatric care management. They have provided unsurpassed medical and general support for my 85 year old mother-in-law (MIL) over the past 2 years while we are living on the West Coast. Their services provide us with peace-of-mind and confidence that our loved one is safe and cared for even when we cannot be present. Their expert care has enabled my MIL to live comfortably alone in her home. They have helped to systematically address and resolve my MILs growing medical issues and ensure that her most pressing challenges are adequately managed. Our life care manager, Kristi - who is a RN - accompanies my MIL to all doctor appointments to ask the right questions during the visit. Kristi maintains a comprehensive picture of my MIL's health conditions and acts as her personal advocate at all doctor visits. We chose Holistic Aging for their fusion of both East and Western treatment modalities that are tailored to the unique individual so along with medical care, my MIL has received acupuncture, nutritional supplements, massage, and myofacial release therapies - all considered to be "alternative" to treatments and normally would not have been offered. However, each of these treatments have majorly improved my MIL's well-being so we welcome the East/West treatment fusion that Holistic Aging provides. We are incredibly grateful and impressed with the service that Holistic Aging provides for our family. I highly recommend them for care of a loved one. Thank you Bobbi and Kristi!read more

Carina Didiano

01:49 20 Aug 18

I just wanted to say how much I appreciate Renee’s work as a nurse with her clients, who are in their early 90’s. I... have worked with her for a while now and she has such a good heart, especially when it comes to her clients well being. She always goes above and beyond for all of them! She deserves the recognition.read more

Dianna Long

01:25 30 Jan 18

Personally sought advice and counsel from the owner - very helpful and knowledgeable about reimbursement and geriatric... aging. Owner keeps up to date on all related geriatric trends and medication trends. True desire to change and help the lives of those aging - to improve the quality of life and ensure maximum reimbursement.read more

Morgan Grimes

20:33 07 Nov 17

Not only does this agency provide excellent care for their cliental, they are a wonderful agency to work for. The... office staff is compassionate and caring not only about their work but their employees as well. The entire staff has very open communication that makes the care individualized and highly affective.read more

Holistic Aging Client

18:23 05 Sep 17

It is difficult to put into words how much Susan’s work with Holistic Aging has meant to our family. After my father... passed away, he left behind our widowed mother, physically weak, depressed and living at some distance from family. She was vulnerable in so many ways, needing help with things including medical and nursing care, physical therapy, transportation, financial protection, troubleshooting and coordinating a complex array of services. We found that we just couldn’t manage everything from a distance, and that what we needed more than anything else was someone acting as Mom’s advocate and coordinating her access to needed supports. Susan stepped in and really took charge of the situation, keeping tabs on everything happening on the medical front, not only making sure that key appointments were made and kept, but also accompanying Mom to them and maintaining organized health reports. Susan ensured that no one was taking financial advantage, that in-home caregivers were providing adequate support, and even that home maintenance problems were addressed. She really made an effort to understand our mother and her unique needs. Susan was willing to play bad cop as necessary, dismissing caregivers who weren’t up to the job, arranging for better ones to be put in place, making sure that physical therapy proceeded on schedule, and pushing back on advice from any service sellers that didn’t serve our mother’s interests. Because Susan was so organized, committed, and pro-active, we are in a much improved situation now: Mom’s health, mental outlook and physical conditioning are all better than they were a couple of years ago. Having Susan there was the closest thing we could manage to actually having a family member on-site to look after our mother.read more

Rebekah Simpson

13:12 19 Oct 16

Bobbi and her team of care manager's have been a "God Send" to our family. My mother has Alzheimer's disease and with... family all over the country, we were not able to assist mom with the needed care she required to continue to live a meaningful life. A friend of ours had used Options For Elder Care services and highly recommend them. They know everything there is to know about Alzheimer's, not only improving my mom's life but realizing the stress of our entire family. We will continue to have challenges as mom progresses through Alzheimer's but feel confident being directed by this care management company.read more

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