My Blog

Taking Care Of An Aging Parent

01/30/2012 19:28:00

For those who are in their middle years, there is nothing so life changing as finding yourself with the responsibility of taking care of your aging parent (or the aging parent of your spouse or partner). Your life changes because 1) you have additional care-taking responsibilities which must fit in and be balanced with your regular life, and 2) you embark on an emotional journey of redefining a relationship with someone of such magnitude (whether good or bad) in your life, and of letting go. It is truly life changing.

Perhaps one of the first things that hits your awareness is that this is not the same mom or dad that you have always known.The first time you interact with your mom, and it’s not your mom, it is more than disconcerting. Whether the change in your parent is mental, physical, or emotional, and whether it is a positive change or a negative change, you are dealing with a juxtaposition of the person who have always known and the person you are with now. This is something you have to work through.

It will dawn on you that the roles you two have previously taken and have been used to have changed. It can be difficult—for you and for them. Parents are the ones who have taken care of YOU! Now, you’re taking care of them.Defining new roles is also something you have to work through.

Perhaps one of the most difficult tasks you will undertake—whether you do so intentionally or not—is to revisit the past. You will revisit their past and yours. You will remember things you do that hurt your parent and feel overwhelming remorse. Or they may feel remorse over their behavior towards you. “Old stuff”gets pulled up and brought to the surface. Suddenly you may feel like you’re a teenager again. Even if the “old stuff” is good and filled with fond memories,it can be emotionally wrenching.

Revisiting the past, however, allows miracles to enter in. Forgiveness will come. Once you work through this, you will find the sweetness. (This is a particularly hard step if your parent was not there for you, or abused or neglected you.) Sometimes that takes hard work and time, butit is more than worth it.

Of tremendous importance to YOU, the care-taker, is to take care of yourself! The physical demands of care-taking leave you exhausted and with no time foryourself. The emotional demands can leave you exhausted and upset as well. It is OK to ask for help. You are not neglecting your parent by taking care of you too.

There are different ways you can take care of yourself, and hiring a coach is one of them. Coaching can help you work through those stages you are going through, discover the legacy your parent is leaving,and help you embrace sweet memories as you let go.

From personal experience, and

In peace and love,

Dr. Anita V.

All writings here are copyrighted by SmartMoments®and/or Dr. Anita V. You may not use them without written permission; however,you may link to the posts or give out a link to the posts.

When Change Does NOT Feel Like An Opportunity!

01/24/2012 16:40:00

Change can be a wonderful opportunity. It’s an opportunity for us to transform from who we are into who we really want to be. However, when we first encounter a major life change, it may not feel like an opportunity! Being diagnosed with a life-threatening illness does not feel like an opportunity. Your partner leaving you for someone else does not feel like an opportunity. Losing your job, having to take care of an elderly parent, and so many more life changes do not initially strike us as an opportunity.

Many times major life changes painfully slam into us, uninvited and unwelcomed. Sometimes, however, they occur because we have not done anything, having not attended to things numbly, until they reach a crisis point. We have all denied something until it reached a pitch so loud that it finally did get our attention. Either way, our initial feeling is NOT one of “Wow! What an opportunity!”

Even when we know in the very back of our minds that the situation we are now facing may provide an opportunity for us to grow, have or do better, be more authentic, it takes a bit of time and a shift in our thought to realize that it is an opportunity. For example, when the last child leaves the nest, and you have thought about all the freedom that gives you, initially it is very strange and uncomfortable, making you wonder if it really is an opportunity.

A friend of mine refers to such situations as an “AGE” – another growth experience. Except that she usually claims that they are “AFGE’s” – well, you know what the additional letter stands for!

Often our reaction is shock, which is then followed by angst about how to deal with this life changing situation. To say it creates disequilibrium is an understatement. The feelings that we have about such changes are much like those in the Kubler-Ross grief cycle: shock, denial, anger, bargaining (seeking in vain for a way out), depression, testing (seeking realistic solutions), and acceptance.

When you find yourself in an AGE, reaching out for assistance is of great help. With assistance you can move through the experience much more easily. There are steps that you can take to work through your feelings, shift your thinking, and turn the situation into an opportunity. Whether you seek a counselor, a clergy person, or a coach, take care of yourself and allow yourself the support you will need.

In peace and love,

Dr. Anita V.

All writings here are copyrighted by SmartMoments® and/or Dr. Anita V. You may not use them without written permission; however, you may link to the posts or give out a link to the posts.

Changes! Perhaps Opportunities?

08/06/2011 20:17:00

Changes! We all face them from time to time, don’t we? In fact, life is filled with change. Our normal developmental path as humans is based on the changes we make over time—we pass from infancy to childhood to adolescence to adulthood, making changes all along the way. Each new stage of life places new demands on us. As we grow and mature, we encounter a number of changes in our lives.

Often change is welcomed, if not sought after. As a child, do you remember not being able to wait until you could ride your bike without training wheels? When you graduated from high school, weren’t you excited (and somewhat scared) about going off to college or getting your new full-time job?

Not all changes are welcomed, however. There are times when it comes out of nowhere. We weren’t seeking it. It’s not welcomed. Did you have a best friend in grade school that moved away? Can you remember the first time your boyfriend or girlfriend broke up with you? Have you ever been laid-off?

There are times when changes are easy for us to make, but there are also times when the change is not easy. In fact, it can be very difficult! Although there are times when we embrace change and times when we fear change, perhaps the majority of time we AVOID change so that we don’t have to decide which time this is!

It’s a shame that we so often avoid making a change, for what is change? Change is an opportunity. What?! Yes, change is an opportunity! –an opportunity to make adjustments in our lives, an opportunity to learn something about ourselves and others, an opportunity to have clarity in the way we have been looking at something, and opportunity to transform who we are into who we want to be.

So the next time you are faced with a change—whether it is one you have invited or one that has encountered you—view it as an opportunity.

In peace and love,

Dr. Anita V.

All writings here are copyrighted by SmartMoments® and/or Dr. Anita V. You may not use them without written permission; however, you may link to the posts or give out a link to the posts.