3 Easy Ways to Improve Communication with Someone Who Has Dementia
The pros absolutely do have secret tips for communicating with people who have dementia. They use these three tactics every day to make life easier on themselves and the people they care for, and by the end of this video, you'll be using them too!
Sleepless in San Diego: Mom's Meltdown
There are moments when, as an adult child, I feel utterly powerless. I feel that way, because I am. My mom struggles, more and more every day, with a disease over which none of us has any control or any answers: Alzheimer's disease.
Three Weak Points of Family Home Care, and What to Do About Them
Being a family caregiver ranges from difficult to brutal. There aren't too many other options. Compared to institutional caregivers, you're at a distinct disadvantage. There's no getting around it, but there are ways to get through it. First, let's make sure you understand the weak spots in your armor and then we'll talk about how to strengthen them.
Restraints in Dementia Care
Are we doing more harm than good to those with dementia by using restraints? This is a question that is being asked more and more and, spoiler alert, the medical profession is proving that more often than not restraints cause more problems than solutions.
The Ultimate Guide: How to Handle the Sandwich Generation Like a Pro
Stuck between taking care of your kids and watching over your parents? That's you, right? Feels like you're on a treadmill that just won't stop. You love them all, but let's face it, sometimes it feels like your own needs are getting squished. It's like juggling chainsaws while balancing on a tightrope, isn't it?
Using Karate on People with Dementia?
In this video, I'm going to teach you the most important skill in martial arts. We'll talk about how it applies to communicating with your loved one with dementia and how you can start mastering this skill today.
A spoiled sandwich
Have you heard of the Sandwich Generation? They are the caregivers who stuck, sandwiched, between caring for their kids and for their parents. Watch the video for more insights into the special pressures they face, and some possible solutions.
Getting Coordinated, No Yoga Required
Reducing coordination stress often starts with accepting that you can't do everything alone and creating systems that work for your specific situation.
Bad TV and Dementia: the surprising link!
When caregiving gets overwhelming, we often just need to lean into the chaos and give ourselves the freedom to laugh, scream, or cry at it.
Best Way to Communicate with Someone Who Has Dementia
If you’re caring for someone with dementia, it may seem like the heart of every problem with care is the inability to communicate. We all understand that language breaks down over time with dementia. As the parts of the brain that hold language are affected by the disease, it becomes more and more difficult to communicate. However, just knowing that doesn’t really help us in the moment. So what can we do?
How to Manage Behavior Without Feeling Overwhelmed
Ever felt like your loved one is fighting against you when resisting care? You're not the only one. These moments can leave you stressed and lost. What can we do?
Best book for grieving someone with dementia
Grieving for someone with dementia is a unique experience, one identified masterfully by Dr. Pauline Boss in her book Ambiguous Loss.
Top 5 things working against home caregivers
When you’re a home and family caregiver, a lot of factors are working against you that the pros don’t have to deal with. Let’s take a look at the top five things that are stacked against you so we have a better idea of how to shift the odds in your favor.
Karate for seniors? Karate ON seniors?!
When our loved ones meet our care with aggression, de-escalation is the most important skill for you. The de-escalation techniques in this article are based on how we trigger calm human behavior in others. These strategies can defuse a lot of difficult situations with an aggressive loved one who lives with dementia.
You Aren’t the Kite
We all meet life’s bruising winds in our own ways. We may often feel like we are blown about like a kite in a storm. But you’re not the kite: please remember this. A kite without a pilot isn’t really a kite: it’s just a piece of trash being kicked around wherever the wind wants to take it. YOU are the one who makes the kite fly. YOU are the pilot.