Inside Aging Parent Care

Respite Care

By Bill November 3rd, 2011

Independence Monument

Respite care for caregivers is a broad definition that boils down to “Give me a break!” Caregivers do direct care for their elder, cook, clean, run errands, provide transportation,entertain, deal with the medical system, agonize over finances, and a myriad of other tasks. This is more than a 24/7 job. It is all-consuming. The caregiver has to get away at times to relax, recharge, enjoy something, fight with the siblings, and collapse. That is respite.

Judi wrote a post about the new VA respite care program. It seems the VA is a pioneer in providing low cost respite care for caregivers. The private sector also has a broad range of respite care programs, but at a significant cost. Most communities have senior day care programs.

That is about it. Most caregivers, …

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Ebooks for Caregivers of Alzheimer’s Patients

By Carol September 27th, 2011

Reviewing Hope for Helpers and More Help for Helpers by Michael Byrd

Bill recently posted his response to Pat Robertson’s remarks on Alzheimer’s disease and caregiving. Bill and many others have expressed another side of the caregiving experience in the wake of Robertson’s suggestion that a man should divorce his wife in advanced stages of the disease. No one denies that caring for someone with dementia is a tough road, but caregivers know that the journey can bring us more than just pain and sacrifice.

Chaplain Michael Byrd has written two timely ebooks for caregivers who want to keep on caregiving and save their sanity. Michael draws on his more than fifteen years experience working with elders and their caregivers to create these helpful companion electronic resources.

While he brings his generous spirituality to …

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Loss and Love

By Bill September 1st, 2011

I am writing fairly brief posts because I am a bit busy caregiving. My wife Carol is recovering nicely from surgery and her son Steve will have surgery Friday. I am caregiver for both.

This story ran in Sunday’s Denver Post newspaper. It is a story about the tragedy of Alzheimer’s and the enduring magic of love. Do read it all. I would insert it here, but copyright laws prevent my doing so.

Alzheimer's

The story is one of someone slowly being robbed of her mind, and her husband’s witness to her decline. She always recognized him, and some elements of her personality stayed with her. This is similar to what happened to Frank and Audrey, Carol’s parents. Frank had significant memory loss, but his personality was intact until he died of other …

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Revisiting the Crocodile: A Caregiver Sums Up

By Carol July 12th, 2011

You never know how a death is going to take you until it happens. Even so, I think it is normal to try to prepare by looking ahead–especially during a long good-bye like my father’s.

We can find so much information on grief and mourning that researching the subject almost gets in the way. After my mother’s death I had a particularly hard time getting past what I’d learned I “should” feel to what I actually was feeling. In the early days after Dad died, I felt stunned. Encountering Death and losing Dad left me disoriented and at loose ends.

I needed structure and some way to understand my life now, post caregiving and orphaned. Three weeks after Dad died, I had this helpful dream: I walk down a hill to the edge of …

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Dad’s Independence Day Redux

By Carol July 3rd, 2011

Here it is–another 4th of July and Dad has been gone more than one full year. We had our quiet remembrance of his passing on Friday. I decided to re-post a piece from last year because it still says it best.

Dad didn’t quite make it to the Fourth of July, but “independence” was his rallying cry. Maintaining his independence was his first concern when he moved to Denver two years ago. Assisted living enabled him to secure the level of independence that he craved. He had his own apartment there, and that became home to him. He made the choice to engage hospice care only when he was assured that he could preserve his independence by remaining in his home.

In the final week of his 91years my father was still …

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