Posts filed under 'aging parents'
By JimG for 3GenFamily Blog
Aging parents often say “I don’t want to burden my children”. But, the truth is that many sons and daughters will need to bear some burden if their parents are to maintain a dignified life as they weaken with age. For some families, the burden will be relatively light and manageable, especially with advanced planning.
For others, even for those gifted with foresight, the load will require appreciable changes in life, i.e., sacrifice. In modern-day America, we would like to think that the dramatic choice between caring sufficiently for our aging parents and pursuing our own most important goals and objectives in life can always be avoided. In my opinion, it is not always possible.
Many people in this situation make the noble choice and compromise their own family life, career development, financial security, leisure pursuits, and overall “quality of life” for their parents. In the end, they get to attend a funeral and are left with a lonely, empty feeling. They’ve probably not been giving their friends as much attention as in earlier times, and thus may not have as much support available once the end finally comes.
Wanted: Stories that Affirm Caregiving as Worthwhile
Hopefully, they know that they did the right thing, that they upheld the most basic notions of common decency and societal virtue. But American culture does not offer them much support and affirmation for that.
I can’t think of any movies or songs or stories that celebrate those who gave away something of themselves to repay their parents for the gift of life. The more prevalent assumption seems to be that such people should have gotten better financial advice or that they did what they did because of an unhealthy psychological dependency.
Instead, I suggest that we turn to the ancient Greeks for some advice, given their great interest in truth and wisdom. I’m not a trained Greek scholar, but I know of one story that might apply here. It is the tale of Cleobis and Biton, as narrated by Solon in the writings of Herodotus and centuries later by Plutarch.
In a nutshell, Cleobis and Biton were two young men who lived with their mother on a farm in Argos, probably a fairly well-off rural estate. Their mother was a patron in good standing at the Temple of Hera, where services and sacrifices were held in honor of the goddess Hera.
To maintain such good standing, it was important to attend the major ceremonies on a regular basis and to arrive punctually. On the day of a festival for the goddess, it was time to hitch the oxen up to the cart that would transport mother over the six miles of roadway that led to the Temple.
However, the oxen were somewhere in the lower forty still plowing. It was clear that mother wasn’t going to make it in time, and was going to lose some points with the high priest or priestess for showing up late (or not at all).
So Cleobis and Biton stepped up and decided that they would latch themselves up to the cart and pull their mom over the bumpy roads to Hera’s Temple. (So much for their pleasant evening sipping wine and watching the sun set from the back porch.)
After a hot and dusty trip, Cleobis and Biton got mom and cart up to the Temple gate in time for the torch procession or however they began a pagan temple service. In their exhaustion, the two sons decided to find a quiet spot somewhere in the Temple, and both soon fell asleep.
As the service progressed, mom invoked the goddess in honor of her two wonderful sons — that they die the happiest of men. Well, this IS an ancient Greek story, so you know there’s an ironic twist involved. And here it comes. After the service was over, mom went to find her two sons and discovered their lifeless bodies. They never woke up from their slumbers. A terrible tragedy.
Rich as Croesus
BUT, on finishing this story, Solon points out to King Croesus that despite the King’s great wealth and his fabulous success in life, he was NOT the happiest of men. The happiest of men were Cleobis and Biton (and also Tellus, another humble man who died honorably enough to be recalled by Solon). Their mother’s wish was granted.
Although their grimy, sweaty exhaustion followed by unforeseen death sounds anything but happy, the ancient Greeks did not measure ‘happiness’ simply by the internal sense of personal satisfaction and fulfillment. They used a more ethereal standard, appealing to the ideals of virtue.
According to the Greeks, Cleobis and Biton were heros and should be emulated (although their mother obviously should have pondered the maxim ‘be careful what you wish for’). They were not poor chumps who got a bad hand because of their own neurotic dependencies and lack of foresight (e.g., they should have thought to send a house servant out to call the oxen back in from the fields a few hours before the service).
The ancient Greeks could indeed be a bit over-dramatic in making their point. I’m not suggesting that a person should be willing to die in the service of dependent parents. In fact, it’s extremely important to take care of yourself while under the stress of parental support.
Honoring Your Parents
But the fact remains that the truest of true happiness doesn’t always SEEM very happy, in the modern sense. Taking care of a dependent parent, whether on the front line, or even in a support role, can be a drag. It DOES sometimes take away some of your own life opportunities and choices.
And there isn’t always a wide assortment of people around who want to support you during your months or years of trial. After you miss four or five New Year’s Eve parties, you may not be getting as many phone calls. Your situation is just not fashionable.
But if it was good enough for the people who gave us Plato and Socrates and Aristotle, perhaps it should be well considered by us moderns too. Just as America learned to ’support our troops’ after the disregard which they unjustly received during the Vietnam years, perhaps we also need to better support those on the front lines of parental caregiving.
Virtue is its own reward, as Herodotus and Plutarch implied. But public acknowledgment of such virtue is also a good thing, as the ancient Greeks also realized.
JimG offers his thoughts about the Greeks, true virtue and caring for parents in this special guest blog for 3GenFamily. You can read more about him and his writing at www.eternalstudent.com.
© 2008 JimG All Rights Reserved.
July 5th, 2008
By CK Wilde for 3GenFamily Blog.
I came across an old photo of my Mom the other day.
She is standing on the lush lawn in front of my sister’s home, her right arm folded primly across her body. Hanging from her arm is her trusty handbag. If you have every seen pictures of Queen Elizabeth II of the UK on an outing, you have seen the formal handbag pose.
Mom’s handbag was a treasure trove of necessities for the modern woman — and for my Dad. You see, whenever they went out of errands together, Mom carried the money, bankbooks, receipts, you name it, and Dad’s reading glasses. He never lost a pair when she was guarding them.
After she died, he resorted to carrying his glasses with case in his shirt pocket. That worked most of the time. He was fortunate that bank employees and medical receptionists would recognize his glass case on the counter or desk and help him remember to put them in his pocket before leaving.
A Service That Returns Your Glasses
You may already be aware that a quality pair of eyeglasses can cost $300 - $400. Even if you are not on a tight budget, losing your glasses can prevent you from going about your daily business. If you can’t drive without them, how do you get to the doctor for a replacement?
The perfect solution has finally arrived — Eyeglass Rescue!
You attach the tags to the glasses and register your contact information either online or by phone. That’s it!
When someone finds your glasses, she or he can call the toll free phone number for Eyeglass Rescue to report finding them. Eyeglass Rescue will help the finder return your glasses to you.
Eyeglass Rescue received its first patent in 2004. Since then, the company reports that it has over 25,000 subscribers and has returned more than 4,000 pairs of glasses to their owners.
And, good deeds get rewarded. Eyeglass Rescue sends the finder a thank-you package of merchandise.
You can order tags for your eyeglasses directly from Eyeglass Rescue’s secure order page on their web site (www.eyeglassrescue.com) or from Walgreens.com and CVS.com.
While you are at it, maybe you want to order a tag for your glasses. There are even special color tags for your child’s glasses. It’s a great solution for everyone in your family, including elderly parents.
© 2008 CK Wilde. All Rights Reserved. Please feel free to link to this post but you must have prior written permission to reproduce this post either whole or in part. Please use the comments to request permission.
July 1st, 2008
By CK Wilde for 3GenFamily Blog
Mothering Mother: A Daughter’s Humorous and Heartbreaking Memoir
* * * * *
“Are you coming to bed, hon?” whispered my sleepy husband.
“In a minute . . . this is such a good book!” I said as I glanced up.
From the first paragraph, Carol O’Dell’s book, Mothering Mother, had me spellbound. I just could not put this book down.
Sleep is my most precious commodity. It is rare for me to stretch the time before I turn out the lights. Yet, this engrossing story made me willingly break my own rule.
Most resources about caregiving focus on cold, factual advice to the reader. While how-to books can be very helpful, they don’t deliver an insider view of the physical and emotional impact of caring for someone daily for an extended period of time.
Mothering Mother propels you into O’Dell’s non-stop whirl of caring for a parent with Parkinson’s disease while caring for teenage daughters with their own needs and trying to sustain her relationship with her husband. Oh, she is also working to keep her sanity.
Alzheimer’s, Too
Through twists and turns in all of their lives, I found myself laughing out loud at some of the crazy-making outbursts from O’Dell’s mother, Noveline. But, I wasn’t laughing at O’Dell or her mother. I was laughing because my Dad or another elder said something totally off the wall just like it.
Then, it hit me. At this point in the story, Noveline has symptoms of Alzheimer’s disease in addition to Parkinson’s, but O’Dell doesn’t know what it is yet. I remember being baffled by things my Dad said. I remember my frustration with Dad’s paranoia and his unwarranted fears.
Dancing As Fast As She Can
Carol O’Dell is startlingly honest in describing her hectic life, her thoughts and her feelings - amused, angry, stressed, exasperated, determined, perplexed, overwhelmed and inspired by events as they occur. If you have never dealt on a daily basis with a baby’s dirty diapers or tried to lift a grown adult who has no strength, some of her descriptions may shock you.
Like most caregivers for aging parents, O’Dell didn’t take classes in geriatric nursing. She’s learning “on the job.” Insurance won’t cover nursing care in the home. Medicare only covers it for a short time after a hospitalization. Hospice help only arrives at the end, long after O’Dell has won the major battles.
Mothering Mother: A Daughter’s Humorous and Heartbreaking Memoir is an important book for caregivers and other family members to read. Certainly, Carol O’Dell’s experience is her own. Yet, the book describes common issues that anyone caring for a parent, or considering it, needs to think carefully about.
Thank you, Carol O’Dell, for sharing your innermost thoughts and feelings with us! This book rates five stars.
Mothering Mother: A Daughter’s Humorous and Heartbreaking Memoir
© 2008 CK Wilde. All Rights Reserved. Please feel free to link to this post but you must have prior written permission to reproduce this post either whole or in part. Please use the comments to request permission.
June 19th, 2008
By CK Wilde for 3GenFamily Blog
http://www.pbs.org/caringforyourparents
I received an email from my cousin about the PBS documentary, Caring for Your Parents, a few days after it aired on April 2, 2008. He wanted to know if I was going to talk about it here. He thought it was a dynamite show.
I missed it the first time it aired. Fortunately, the entire show is available at the PBS website. So I was able to watch it today.
Wow!
The Caring for Your Parents website has divided the show into small sections. I was only going to sample a few sections to get a sense of what the show was about. That turned out to be nearly impossible. I had to watch the entire show.
The show’s producer, writer and director, Michael Kirk tread a fine line between respecting the private aspects of each of these five families from Rhode Island while having them describe the unvarnished truth of their lives as caregivers for their aging parents. We follow them over the course of a year. From well-to-do to working class, each family is coping with their parents evolving lives. Several of these families were dealing with parents with dementia.
It’s funny how we sometimes think our own situation is different or unique. I was struck by how eerily similar many of the conversations between adult child and parent and health care provider were to my conversations with my father.
Early in the show, one of the parents was being reminded by his doctor that he needed to give up driving a car because his memory has started to fail. The conversation was so similar to ones I had with my Dad that I was stunned!
The families and situations were varied but the major themes were the same as those I had encountered. Here are a few highlights:
1. Many of our parents believe in being self-sufficient. They will not mention problems they are having because they don’t want to be a burden. So, it is important to have conversations about finances and medical care and to continue having conversations as your parents’ health changes. Their choices and decisions and wishes need to be written down. It’s not one conversation–it’s many over time.
2. Your interactions with your adult siblings regarding your parents will mirror the interactions you had when you were younger. If your fought as kids, you will likely fight about your parents’ wellbeing. You can break out of the old pattern. You need to toss your expectations away about what your siblings ought to be doing. Inter-family anger is likely when one sibling does all the caregiving. It needs to be dealt with in a positive way.
3. The family members providing care often deal with highly technical medical information in order to provide a parent with informed care. It practically takes a Masters degree to deliver medication, understand what the issues are, speak for the patient when she/he can speak for themselves and make the excruciating decision on when to stop a treatment that isn’t working.
4. All of this work takes a huge toll on the caregiver whose health may be in jeopardy from the stress and self-denial. Of the five families, the caregivers who took time to take care of themselves fared significantly better than those that didn’t.
Director, Michael Kirk, tries to end on an upbeat note by talking about “Transformative Moments”. My own experience bears out that there are often funny, happy and special moments shared with your parents as you care for them. The more you focus on those moments of joy the easier it is to get through the difficult moments.
Caring for Your Parents forces us to confront the idyllic myth that we and our parents may have of their independently living out their days in happy retirement until their “time is up.” Our elders are living longer, often in poorer health. They need more and more of our help as time goes on.
This documentary is a real eye opener. Please do watch it.
It is available for viewing on the PBS website and the DVD is available for purchase.
Caring for Your Parents
© 2008 CK Wilde. All Rights Reserved. Please feel free to link to this post but you must have prior written permission to reproduce this post either whole or in part. Please use the comments to request permission.
May 4th, 2008
By CK Wilde for 3GenFamily Blog.
Ripe, juicy tomatoes were my father’s obsession. Every year, Dad would plant enough tomato plants to keep our family of four and my grandparents, my aunt and her husband and my uncle and his family with huge beefsteak and oval plum tomatoes all summer long. At summer’s end, he and my mother would spend weekends canning tomatoes.
After many August weekends of canning whole tomatoes, my mother revolutionized her life by canning tomato sauce which could be used right from the jar to prepare meals. Much later on my parents discovered the wonders of freezing the sauce to keep more of the fresh made taste.
Getting bumper crops of tomatoes took a lot of work preparing the soil, starting plants from seeds, planting and then watering and tending the plants. Most spring and summer evenings, you would find my father out in his garden helping plants grow.
Two Packs A Day
And, during that time, my father was a two pack-a-day smoker. He quit “cold turkey” one day after 35 years of smoking because a coughing fit left him wheezing and unable to catch his breath. In that instant, he finally realized that his only choice was to stop smoking.
He continued to vigorously garden until his late 70’s when his second wife pronounced the garden “too much work for him” and urged him to give it up. Believe it or not, the garden seemed to be the source of his energy and strength.
Over the next few years, Dad’s health slid into decline. Hospitalizations became more frequent.
Gardening and Salads?
So even though it seems a bit far fetched, it doesn’t surprise me that the researchers at the University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center found recently (December 2007) that smokers and non-smokers may be able to reduce the risk of lung cancer by eating salads 4 or more times per week and working in the garden 1 or 2 times per week.
Cynical reviewers could say that this research is nothing more than getting exercise and eating the right kinds of foods. Yet, I wonder if there is something additional going on?
Thwarting Pesky Gophers!
When my children were in preschool and first grade, we tended a little garden in tubs placed in a sunny spot near our front door. We grew all plants in containers to thwart the gophers who managed to devour everything in their path.
After a few minutes of pulling weeds and watering, I would lapse into a reverie — an almost primal connection to the earth. The warmth of the sun would melt the tension from the week. Stretching and bending felt so good after a week of desk sitting. I would be refreshed and ready for the hectic week ahead.
In a number of weeks after all of my solicitous garden tending, we would be rewarded with the most delicious tasting vegetable and herbs. An added benefit of all of the work in the garden is that , even today, my sons willingly eat salads and vegetables!
And now, the researchers at M.D. Anderson Cancer Center have been able to empirically show that eating vegetables (antioxidants, vitamins and minerals) and getting outdoors to get some sun (Vitamin D) and exercise (reduce stress and condition the heart and lungs) can save smokers lives.
It is a sad irony that just a few years after my father gave up gardening, he died of lung cancer.
If you have a parent or spouse who smokes, don’t give up on getting him or her to quit. 80 percent of lung cancers are related to smoking tobacco.
In the meantime, you might want to suggest heading out to the garden to plant some veggies.
© 2008 CK Wilde. All Rights Reserved. Please feel free to link to this post but you must have prior written permission to reproduce this post in any manner. Please use the comments to request permission.
March 20th, 2008
My father only had a couple thousand dollars of life insurance in force by the time he turned 83. He outlived the term of one policy, so the insurance company paid him the cash value and terminated the policy.
As someone who was deeply affected by the Depression, Dad would probably have jumped at the chance to sell a life insurance policy for more than the cash value. But, as someone in the early stages of dementia, he was vulnerable to being swindled. We had one close call with his investments.
I want to alert you to the booming business in life settlements that is still largely unregulated.
Help for the Terminally Ill
It started out as a compassionate way to help someone who has large medical bills to pay. It’s called a viatical settlement. It gives a person, typically with less than two years to live, who owns a large cash value life insurance policy but does not have a spouse or children, a way to get cash out of the policy.
Cash value insurance policies (also called whole life) have provisions for the owner to cancel the policy and receive the “surrender value”. But, this amount is usually very small compared to the total amount of insurance. The settlement company is usually willing to pay much more. The viatical settlement became popular during the 1980’s as a way to help terminally ill AIDS patients deal with the high cost of medical care.
A New Investment is Born
The purchased insurance policies from those early viatical settlements were sold to individual investors. Because this new investment was unregulated, it attracted some unscrupulous dealers. Salesmen were paid high commissions to sell the policies to investors who did not always understand what they were buying. The investment community soured on buying settlements.
In 2001, the National Association of Insurance Commissioners released the Viatical Settlements Model Act which established guidelines for ensuring sound business practices and avoiding fraud. It was about that same time that settlement dealers began purchasing policies using institutional capital. The demand for settlements as an investment began to increase.
Better Than Mortgages?
From an investor’s standpoint, buying insurance policies is even better than buying mortgages. Everyone dies! As long as the insurance policy was written by a company that is solid, the investor gets paid.
Investing in mortgages, once considered much safer than stocks or bonds, is not as predictable. People can get sick or disabled, lose there jobs, or have other life events that prevent them from paying the mortgage. US economic problems today were caused in part by defaults on mortgages — many made by unscrupulous brokers who bent the rules.
Most mortgages today are combined into packages that re-sold to large institutional investors. It wasn’t long before some enterprising folks figured out that they could package these purchased policies, now called life settlements, and sell them to institutional investors for generous commissions.
Easy To Be Taken In By Easy Money
It happened to Larry King, CNN’s famous talk show host. King alleges in a lawsuit filed recently that he was the victim of a scam to buy and sell life insurance on himself, also called “flipping” policies. While King made $1.4 million on the deals, he now realizes that he would have been better off if he had kept the policies. He feels that he was cheated.
An insurance company owns the $15 million in policies, a company by the name of Coventry Insurance. Coventry was sued last year by the State of New York for alleged predatory practices.
Yesterday, our local newspaper, the San Jose Mercury News, reported that flyers were circulating at a San Luis Obispo, California senior center telling seniors they could get as much as $50,000 from “investors that want to speculate on our life expectancy.”
Although the NAIC issued the Viatical Settlements Model Act in 2001 and amended it in 2007 to strengthen consumer protections for “Stranger- Originated Life Insurance” only 35 states have officially adopted the guidelines. California, where I live, has not yet adopted any guidelines.
What’s The Harm?
If Larry King, who is a reasonably intelligent 73 year old, could be duped, anyone could be. Particularly someone in the early stages of dementia.
Life insurance is just one part of a total financial plan. Selling a life insurance policy really needs to be evaluated in terms of the person’s overall needs and financial status. These life settlement companies are not doing that.
So we caregivers need to be alert to these issues. If your parent tells you about a wonderful opportunity to sell an old life insurance policy, get to the financial planner or attorney to have the deal reviewed right away. Who is buying the policy? Will it be sold to a third party? Who is that?
The Mercury News article quoted Jay Adkisson, an attorney who writes a blog about financial fraud, “You ought to know who you are selling to. You don’t want Tony Soprano buying your life insurance policy.”
Good advice.
March 10th, 2008
Sorry, Eric (Schmidt, CEO of Google).
Google doesn’t belong in the health records business.
For those of you who don’t follow Google’s business on a daily basis, here is a brief rundown of what has happened.
Last year, Microsoft announced a new service called Health Vault to help individuals manage health records online. This is not a revolutionary idea. There are already several smaller companies on the Internet offering individuals the convenience of storing health records online so that they are more available when they are needed. Several of the large players in the business of providing technology to doctors offices and medical clinics also have digital records initiatives.
But, no one company has been able to gain serious momentum in digital health records. It is a gargantuan task to coordinate doctors, labs, hospitals, pharmacies, insurance companies and individuals AND meet all of the requirements of HIPAA for privacy. Microsoft has already collected an impressive number of partners to work with Health Vault.
Google Announcement Starts Tsunami
In Orlando, Florida last week, Google announced Google Health, a platform for individuals to manage medical records such as medical test results and prescriptions. The announcement set off a wave of protests from consumer privacy advocates. Eric Schmidt is trying to soothe the uproar by saying that Google won’t sell ads on Google Health.
Oh really?
Here’s how one analyst sees the situation:
“Gene Munster, an analyst at Piper Jaffray, firmly believes ads will happen. ‘Advertisers would pay absurd amounts of money to be seen when someone wants to, say, refill a subscription online,’ he says.’ This is more lucrative than commerce-related search.” For the complete story, click here to see Jefferson Graham’s article in USA Today.
Digital Records Could Save Lives
I’m not a Luddite. I work for a company that develops mobile technology.
And, I have had to fight ferociously with doctor’s office administrators to obtain my Dad’s medical records as well as my own and my children’s records. In one case, I had to pay $100 for a file of poor photocopies that I could barely read. Forget about scanning to digitize them.
My father was caught in the bind between doctor and hospital. His regular family doctor had all of his records but she wasn’t admitted to practice at the hospital closest to my father’s home. The hospital would “assign” him a doctor while he was there. But the records never made it back to the family doctor.
The cardiologist at the hospital might not have put my father on Plavix if the doctor knew my father had a history of gastrointestinal bleeding. At one point, the docs who did not talk to each other had my father on DOUBLE doses of 4 different medications. It only got corrected because he could feel that the medications were not working right. He went to the family doctor who reduced all the doses and got rid of the duplicate medications.
That was a close call! And, it is a safe bet that this happens to thousands of Americans everyday.
If you have experienced anything like this, you may think I am crazy to oppose help from the two tech companies that have the best chance of making digital records happen. Pam Dixon, executive director of the non-profit World Privacy Forum, said it best,”A publicly traded company is supposed to have shareholders (my emphasis) in mind first.” (As quoted in an Associated Press article by Travis Reed.)
The Push for Quarterly Profits
Wall Street, institutional and individual shareholders are illogically relentless in their push for quarterly profits from publicly traded companies. Every employee knows what ROSHE (Return on Shareholder Equity) its company is trying to achieve. The focus may be making customers happy so they buy more product or service but the goal is always ROSHE.
The bulk of Google’s revenue comes from selling ads. Microsoft sells software and services. These companies are locked in a battle to gain your attention for its products and partners’ products. Each is working to dominate the marketplace.
So, it is easy to envision a scenario in which our personal privacy gets compromised.
But, it doesn’t have to be that way.
Microsoft has the platforms to connect little devices like a glucose monitor to your home computer but its web sites infrastructure is not as strong as Google’s. (Full disclosure– my company is a Microsoft Partner. I have many good things to say about Microsoft but not when it comes to its web sites.)
Google has the digital infrastructure to power web-based communications around our planet. If you use Google to search the Internet, you are tapping into an amazing, gigantic, distributed network that gives you search results after it has filtered out over 3 million malicious or problematic web sites in a small fraction of a second. But, even Google admits that its first version of a G-Phone is buggy beyond belief.
I admire both companies for what they have achieved and the vision they espouse. But both companies have the compelling need to make ROSHE. Right now Google has advertisers that are willing to pay $25, $50 or more when a person visits the advertiser’s web site. The possibilities for enormous revenue for delivering pharmaceutical ads, for example, to consumers are easy to imagine. Google has all of the technology from Double Click to track every purchase you make. It’s only a short step to your entire medical file.
Microsoft has slightly different, yet just has huge revenue possibilities. It’s making the Wall Street analysts giddy with thoughts of double digit quarterly profits.
The Third Alternative — A Consortium
It’s hard to get things done by committee. Compromises can result in gazelles that look more like camels. But sometimes a non-profit organization or a governmental entity is the only way to protect citizens from the fallout of the giant corporate gladiators.
From my vantage point, the only way to assure that digital health care information does not become another series of battles like Blu-Ray versus HD-DVD (or Betamax vs. VHS for those who have long memories) is to have a non-profit consortium responsible to citizens to safeguard privacy and set standards for interoperability.
Think of the headaches if you want to change doctors but the new doctor doesn’t use the same medical records system. If you choose to go with the new doctor, you have to figure out a way to get all of the pertinent data into the new system. That’s more time out of your week, more money out of your pocket, and another point where your information could be corrupted or misused.
Now is the time for Microsoft and Google to call a truce and become part of a non-profit consortium for health care records. It won’t be perfect, but when consumers trust that their information is safe, they will sign up to buy in droves. And that would make Wall Street happy, too.
February 29th, 2008
And, Make Sure to Have Pudding for Dessert
What?!
A popular nutrition newsletter arrived in my email today talking about Vitamin D deficiency in the US. I was surprised to read that Vitamin D deficiency is very common in the US. A recent study in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition (January 2008) found that a low blood concentration of Vitamin D was associated with higher blood pressure in Caucasians (but not African Americans.)
It seems that researchers are finding all sorts of health issues that a little bit more vitamin D would lessen or prevent. Most important for seniors — Vitamin D helps your body use calcium to build stronger bones.
Hip or other bone fractures are often the beginning of a grindingly slow downward spiral for many seniors. Less mobility leads to even less mobility. The end of the line is the nursing home.
The crying shame is that Vitamin D is so easy to get through our diet, supplements and sunlight. Eggs, tuna, salmon, mackerel and sardines are good sources of Vitamin D along with fortified milk products.
Your daily vitamin probably contains it, but not enough. The recommended daily allowance is 400 IUs. Many all in one supplements contain less than half that amount.
More Is Better
Dr. Andrew Weil, (click here) highly respected for his approach to combining nutrition with traditional medicine, recommends 1000 IUs per day and even more if you don’t get out in the sun at all. His recommendation comes after extensive research into the latest studies on Vitamin D.
His conclusion: More is Better!
Love the One You’re With
Here’s an easy way to show your Valentine you care. Take your parent (or loved one) out for a walk in the sunshine, weather permitting. Just 15-20 minutes of sun on your hands and face is enough. But, don’t put on sunscreen. It blocks your body’s ability to make Vitamin D. Take the sunscreen with you to apply after you get a bit of sun if you’ll be out more than 20 minutes.
Then, have a lovely salmon dinner. Tuna sandwiches are ok, too (go light on the mayo.)
And, top it off with pudding made with fortified milk (nondairy, if milk is a problem). Sorry, milk chocolate truffles don’t count.
Both People Benefit
Spending time with someone to celebrate has benefits for your parent, loved one and you. Mind, body and spirit. Don’t miss out.
February 14th, 2008
Dad rarely travelled outside of a 10 mile radius of his home. The one or two times each year that he needed to go farther, he would enlist someone to drive with him. So, I never pressed the issue of getting a cell phone for emergencies.
When I showed him my newest phone, he dismissed it saying,” The buttons are too small. I can’t read that screen. I’m hard of hearing, you know!”
Then came the accident.
Dad was driving back from the car dealership, took a wrong turn onto the New Jersey Turnpike, got lost and tried to find his way back through a neighborhood he had never seen before. Peering sideways to read the street signs, he veered into a parked car. Crash!!
My father was a very lucky man. The owners of the parked car were looking out their kitchen window when it happened. They rushed to help him.
He climbed out of his car, shaken, but not injured. At first, the police thought he was drunk. When my father told the police he was a diabetic and could not drink, they worried that his blood sugar was too low.
Eventually, Dad convinced them that he didn’t need an ambulance, just someone to take care of his car and give him a ride home. Those good samaritans who witnessed the accident called someone to take care of the car. The car repairman took my Dad home.
My father waited for several days before telling me about the accident. He knew before I said a word that I would urge him to give up driving. He did stop driving shortly after that incident. It had scared him that much!
It scared me, too. What if nobody had been around to help?
I wish that my Dad had had a Jitterbug phone.
Jitterbug cell phones are designed to be easy to use with big, back-lit buttons, large text, and a powerful speaker for loud, clear conversations.
What makes the Jitterbug phone perfect for seniors is the live, 24 hour operator service. The operators will make calls for you, assist you with finding a phone number from a directory or add names to your phone list. (5 minutes are deducted from your minutes for each operator assist.)
The best part is there are no contracts and no long distance roaming fees. You choose the plan that’s right for you (as low as $10 per month.) You can even share minutes with another family member.
If your parent likes to go out and about but you worry, get your parent this phone for the holidays or any gift giving occasion. The price of the phone is very modest – $147. The peace of mind for a caregiver is priceless.
To learn more about the Jitterbug phone and service plans, click here.
photo courtesy of GreatCall, Inc.
December 13th, 2007
The mood was relaxed and happy on the five hour flight from California to New Jersey. It was Thanksgiving Day. The sun was just beginning to set on what must have been an unseasonably warm day on the East Coast. I smiled to myself. The plane had arrived ahead of schedule. I would be at my father’s home in time for dinner with him.
The airport shuttle driver let me off outside the patio of my Dad’s place. I could see Dad was sitting motionless in his recliner in the corner of the room. Only the kitchen light was on, but I could easily peer into this tiny garden apartment in an independent senior living community. It had been my father’s comfortable home for the past year.
The TV was off. Dad must have fallen asleep, again.
I knocked on the glass patio door and eventually woke him from his nap. He was overjoyed to see me. But, his mood went from gleeful to glum in only a minute. “I’m sorry. I’m afraid I don’t have dinner for you,” he said.
In our phone conversations over the past few days, my father had chatted cheerfully about preparing his favorite dish, baked turkey legs, for us for Thanksgiving. He had discovered a great recipe by accident and wanted to share it with me.
“I guess I fell asleep and didn’t hear the timer,” he continued. “ The turkey legs were totally burnt even though I had them in a low, 250 degree oven.”
“How long do you think you overslept?” I asked.
“Oh, it might have been six hours,” Dad said sheepishly.
“That’s ok. You have some hamburgers in the freezer that we can make, right?” I said trying to sound upbeat. (Did I hear that right, six hours?)
I walked into the kitchen to start preparing the hamburgers. The stove was dirty. Pots had boiled over and burnt remains littered the trays under the burners. I peered into the oven. It was just as dirty. The entire apartment smelled like burnt food. This was a major change since my last visit.
I tried to hide my uneasiness as the realization began dawning on me that Dad was not able to safely cook for himself anymore.
“Gee, Dad, it looks like you had a few pots spill over,” I said.
“Yeah, pots boil over from time to time. It’s no big deal,” he growled.
“Looks like you could use some help with the cleaning, Dad. ”
“I’m doing fine by myself! I don’t have extra money pay for cleaners. I have barely enough to live on! ” Dad’s growl had turned into a shout.
Lowering my voice, I turned to him with a big smile, “I know you have done a really great job managing your money. It is looking like you could use a little help here, that’s all.”
That was the beginning of a weekend-long argument. I gave my father all sorts of suggestions for ways he could get help. He rejected every one.
We met with a non-medical in home care provider. Dad turned pale when he heard the hourly rate. I got out the rate sheet for the additional cleaning services that the senior apartment complex offered.
“That’s too much! Dad shouted.
Finally, I hit upon the idea of Dad purchasing the meal plan from the dining room. Together, we figured out how much he spent on food. It looked like buying dinner on the meal plan would not cost much more than he was already spending.
I reasoned and cajoled. Dad finally agreed that he would enjoy getting his evening meal from the dining room. All that was left to do was for my father to sign up for the plan on Monday. He said he would do it.
I left for the airport on Sunday evening with a light heart.
On Monday, I phoned to remind him to sign up for the meal plan. He began to waffle. Maybe he would wait until December. Maybe he would wait until he finished the food in the freezer. Maybe he would wait until . . .
Of course, I knew these were just excuses. For each one, I countered with a reasonable argument. Dad thought up another. He wasn’t going to do it and I was too far away to exert the same kind of influence I had when I was physically there.
A November 2007 study by the National Alliance for Caregiving and Evercare found that the long distance caregivers spend an average of $8728 per year out of their own pockets to help an elderly family member. Local caregivers spend somewhat less — approximately $5000 annually.
And, it is no surprise to me that the largest percentage of this expense is going to provide care attendants, followed closely by medical expenses and long distance travel. I had already been spending money for travel to see my Dad. Once your parent needs care, but cannot or will not pay for help, the family may need to provide it. Those of us who work are forced to rely on paid helpers to to assist with eldercare. Bu, this can have a negative financial impact on the family members paying for care.
Fate took a different turn with my father. Later that week, he developed a nose bleed that the nurses at the retirement community could not stop. His trip to the hospital ended up lasting over three months.
The nurses also reported to the managers that Dad was having trouble keeping up the apartment. The managers said they would refuse to allow him back into his apartment when he was released from the hospital for his own safety.
Now instead of convincing him to eat in the dining room, I had to convince him to move to the next level of care. To be continued . . .
November 26th, 2007
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