Dave O’Brien, the “Sit With a Brit” guy who works for himself as a home care giver shared this article with me, I strongly suggest that you follow the link and read the whole thing. Its very concise giving the 7 emotions that will make elder care more difficult than it has to be while sabotaging the best efforts.
In the first part of my book, You Can Keep Your Parents at Home (link) I talk about how to let go of these emotions and in my last 5 posts, I describe how to let go of resentment, specifically. My method would work very well for all of these elder care pitfalls in the article.
Spencer Scott writes that ‘guilt’, ‘resentment’, ‘anger’, ‘worry’, ‘loneliness’, ‘worry’ and ‘defensiveness’. I am sure that all of you have felt some or all of those emotions as you deal with the day to day of elder care. My previous 5 post deal specifically with resentment, but those points and the plan in the book can help you with the rest.
The author has a very practical set up. First she defines the general causes of the emotion, then why it matters, how it hurts you and finally, what you can do about it.
Guilt is one of the emotions to “Let Go” in order to do successful in elder care. Spencer Scott specifically talks about guilt of not being good enough and recommends “lowering your standards” and I agree. People often make the mistake of expecting perfection and allowing that to get in the way of good. In my book I paraphrased D.W. Winnecott by saying, “Good enough elder care is what your parents really need”.
I will teach you how to “lower your standards” in the best possible way that will make your experience with elder care the best possible for all. If I have your email I can notify you of upcoming events and calls to help you with this.
You can find the book, You Can Keep Your Parents At Home on Amazon