Top Tips for Caring for Aging Parents

DavidPage

Many people say that they promised their aging parents that they would never place them in a nursing home. As long as everyone is safe, it is a great idea to keep aging parents at home. Do you need 24-hour live-in assistance? At Carefour we can organize and manage live in care at your home, which is completely specific to your situation. You can schedule live in carer now and it’s much easier than you might think.

Senior care can be one of the most difficult and stressful jobs you will ever have. We offer tips to help you continue your long-term caregiving work by decreasing the caregiver workload and decreasing stress.

Learn how to take care of your skin

Many caregivers find it difficult to see the bigger picture when they are overwhelmed by a list of caregiving tasks. First, determine how much care your senior adult needs. You can create a list with daily, weekly, or monthly care tasks to help you determine how much assistance is required during the day, night, and weekends.

You will see how much supervision you need and when it is most important.

A quick way to compile a list is to use a notepad and take notes each time someone or you help your older adult.

You’ll be able to see what your senior needs and when they need it after a week.

Keep taking notes longer so you can capture everything.

You need to be realistic about the amount of care you can give without compromising your health.

Once you have a better understanding of your senior adult’s care needs, you can determine if you are able to handle it yourself.

Perhaps you can see the list and realize you need to be able to do a lot of different tasks.

Consider how much care you are able to provide without compromising your health during your evaluation.

You should remember that you can burn out or get a serious condition if you work too hard. This will make it impossible to care for others.

Be proactive and look for ways to help your family and maintain your health.

Help with caring

Although it may seem that finding caregiving assistance takes too much effort and time, it is an investment that will pay dividends in the long-term.

It takes patience, effort and creative thinking to find help, but it will pay off when you are able reduce your workload, reduce stress and take frequent breaks.

Keep an open mind and be flexible to help you see more opportunities for help.

Partarise in the caregiving responsibility

Your job might be so amazing that no one thinks you’re capable of caring for an older adult.

Even if you don’t feel the need to, ask your siblings and close family members if they will take on some of the responsibility to allow you to take needed breaks.

Every situation is different and will require different methods of getting help from loved ones.

It could be one person moving mom to her sister’s home for a year.

One person might live with their dad for two months while another person or their sibling lives with them.

Other cases could be that your sister stays at your home for a week every other month so you can go on vacation.

Be flexible and creative if they are willing to help. There is no perfect solution, but you will have less work if you get help.