Take My Hand Again: A Faith-Based Guide for Helping Aging Parents - Softcover

Brummett, Nancy Parker

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0825443717 ISBN 13: 9780825443718

Verlag: KREGEL PUBN, 2015

Inhaltsangabe

Practical, humorous and faith-filled

Addressing the difficult decisions adult children face when roles change and they must intervene in a parent’s care, Take My Hand Again includes an overview of common care options and questions to ask--of professionals, of prospective care facilities, and of the aging adults themselves. Readers will find valuable insight into the challenges of the aging process as well as much-needed hope and encouragement.

“Nancy has written a practical yet hope-filled book that is sure to help both younger and older generations reexamine their roles with love and grace as together they navigate through the uncertainties of later years.”
--Missy Buchanan, speaker and author of Voices of Aging: Adult Children and Aging Parents Talk with God

“Her warm, tender approach is grounded in both personal experience and careful research. . . . All with a focus on maximizing the respect and dignity of older adults while comforting those providing care.”
--Sara Honn Qualls, clinical geropsychologist and coauthor of Caregiver Family Therapy

“This is the most comprehensive book on aging and caregiving I've ever seen. It is an excellent resource for anyone facing either one or both of these issues. Great stories, great ideas, great solutions!”
--Dr. Helen B. McIntosh, author of Messages to Myself: Overcoming a Distorted Self-Image

Über diesen Titel

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Nancy Parker Brummett is an author and speaker who has focused on ministries to the older population and those who care for them for several years. She holds a professional certificate in gerontology and was the founding president of the board of directors for Ronald McDonald House Charities of Southern Colorado. The author of The Hope of Glory, a devotional for use in assisted-living settings, Brummett frequently speaks to community organizations, women's groups, and conferences. Visit her website at www.nancyparkerbrummett.com.

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Take My Hand Again

A Faith-Based Guide for Helping Aging Parents

By Nancy Parker Brummett

Kregel Publications

Copyright © 2015 Nancy Parker Brummett
All rights reserved.

ISBN: 978-0-8254-4371-8

Contents

Acknowledgments, 11, 
Introduction, 13, 
1 Changing Roles, 15, 
2 Knowing What to Do, 29, 
3 Deciding Where My Parent Will Live, 42, 
4 Putting the Heart in Home, 57, 
5 Driving or Not?, 70, 
6 Focusing on Friendship, 82, 
7 Understanding the Aging Mind, 95, 
8 Living with the Aging Body, 106, 
9 Staying Young at Heart, 122, 
10 Celebrating Old Souls, 141, 
11 Taking Care, 152, 
12 Holding Hands Across the Miles, 167, 
13 Leaving a Legacy, 181, 
14 Letting Go, 194, 
Notes, 209, 
Recommended Resources, 219, 
About the Author, 223, 

CHAPTER 1

CHANGING ROLES

Honor your father and your mother, so that you may live long in the land the Lord your God is giving you. — Exodus 20:12

On one of my visits to Tennessee from Colorado to visit my mother at her assisted living community the two of us started down the hall toward the dining room for dinner. Holding on to the railing that ran along one side of the wall with her right hand, my little five-foot mom reached her left hand out to grab hold of mine. "Somehow I always feel better when you're here to hold my hand," she said, as down the hall we went.

I knew that feeling well. When I was a little girl and Mom took me downtown to shop for a new Easter dress or back-to-school shoes, I felt better when she held my hand as we crossed the busy street. Going up those big, tall steps into the school where I would start kindergarten, I couldn't have made it without her hand to steady me. All my life I'd found security in reaching out for her and knowing she was there for me. Now she was saying, "Take my hand again," only it was my mom needing the reassurance, and I was the one being asked to find the courage and strength to provide it.

It's not like she was alone during the months between my visits. My two sisters were local and visited her frequently, and she was surrounded by other caregivers and friends in her assisted living community. But Mom liked knowing all three of her "chicks" were home to roost, and so holding my hand gave her a special sense of security.

To say I was pleased to take her hand is an understatement. But most of us, if we are honest with ourselves, are reluctant to accept the role transition such a simple gesture represents. We see signs of aging in our parents that startle or alarm us, but we dismiss them as momentary lapses or anomalies. After all, if we accept that we now must be the one to make the decisions and carry the load, then we are relinquishing the security we've always found in relying on our parents to do that.

Furthermore, how do we honor our fathers and mothers in this season of their lives? Do we support their wishes and desire for independence, or do we express our heartfelt concerns and insist on changes to protect their welfare? If we choose the latter, how strange that the role of caregiver and protector now becomes ours to play.

In her book Caring for Yourself While Caring for Your Aging Parents, Claire Berman writes about an encounter she had with a young man, an international lawyer, at a dinner party. It clearly illustrates how difficult and confusing such a change in roles can be. "The change in my mother has been very much on my mind of late," the young man said, "because the situation at my firm is no longer as stable as I'd like it to be, and I've been wondering whether to make a move. Many's the time I find myself instinctively reaching for the phone, wanting to talk to my mother about this, but then I stop myself because I realize that Mother's no longer able to support me in this way. I have found myself of late feeling a mixture of love and irritation toward my mother. She's eighty-four now, losing her grip on reality, and I have to be there for her instead of the other way around. The fact is, I want the mother I always had."

This loss of the parent we always had is a long process of grief and acceptance. Where's the mom with the insightful relationship advice? Who's going to fix the leak under the sink when Dad can't? We all tend to long for the parent we are already losing, and our reluctance to accept the role transition has nothing to do with our chronological age. Some of my friends lost their mothers at a young age and were involved in their care when they were only in their twenties or thirties. A special friend of my mom's was in his eighties when his mother passed away in a nursing home, but I don't think he found it any easier to say good-bye when the time came. None of them took the caregiving role lightly nor assumed it without some denial.

Regardless of how old we are when the roles change, we just wish things could stay the way they were a bit longer. We're scared. Our aging parent is scared. We don't know if we are up to the challenge. But we're sure of one thing: in the midst of so much uncertainty, holding hands is a good idea.

Generations Together

Not so long ago in America, and in some rural areas yet today, the question of who would care for Grandma or Grandpa as they aged was predetermined. The generations shared one home, and so naturally the elder person would age in place with a loving family to care for him or her.

Until she passed away when I was sixteen, my Granny Parker lived with us. Actually, my mother and father moved into her big farmhouse in Tennessee to help her take care of the place after my grandfather passed away at a young age, so it's more accurate to say we lived with her.

I don't think my parents intended to stay for long, but they did, and as our family began to grow, we gradually took over more and more of the house. It was Granny's choice to turn most of the house over to us, but she still lived with us. Of course, the benefit of this arrangement for my sisters and me was that she was always present in our lives.

My sisters and I were never uncomfortable in the company of older people because we lived with Granny. We never had a babysitter. If my parents went out, we just stayed home with Granny. On one of those evenings, Granny played the piano and coached me through the singing of two hymns so I could try out for the school chorus. Then she made me promise not to tell anyone she could still play the piano, because she didn't want to be drafted to play for church or family events! I'm in my midsixties now, and I still think of her whenever I sing "Fairest Lord Jesus" or "This Is My Father's World."

I learned a lot about aging just hanging out with Granny playing games, reading stories, or even plucking the hair that grew out of her chin for her. Daily I observed the way my mom stepped in to drive Granny to see her friends or to the doctor. I never knew that taking care of her mother-in-law was such a sacrifice on my mom's part — because she never made it seem like one. It was simply her role to fulfill.

My times alone with Granny were intimate and authentic, and many are forever etched in my memory. A special one comes to mind as if it were yesterday. My grandmother is sitting on our screened-in back porch with a big silver bowl in her lap and a big brown bag of what we call "string beans" in Tennessee on the picnic table beside her. As I watch her snap, snap, snap, I'm lulled by the rhythm of her pace and mesmerized by the sight of her gnarled old fingers as she...

Details zur Ausgabe

• Verlag: KREGEL PUBN
• Erscheinungsdatum: 2015
• Sprache: Englisch
• ISBN 10: 0825443717
• ISBN 13: 9780825443718
• Einband: Taschenbuch
• Anzahl der Seiten: 224
• Kontakt zum Hersteller: Nicht verfügbar
• Verantwortliche Person: Buchbär; info@buchbaer.de; ; Weberstr. 67; Osnabrück; 49084; Deutschland