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Helping Aging Adults Overcome Distressing Changes in Their Circumstances.
Who are the people I see?
I attend to older adults who are experiencing difficulties coping with their life circumstances – young seniors over 55 and older and frail persons, who are living either at home or in a long-term care facility and are dependent on caregivers for their basic living needs.
What are some distressing challenges often facing older adults?
To name just a few: Uncertainty about retirement; loss of social status; marginalization and social isolation; late life marriage; separation and divorce; illness in the family; physical pain; decline in physical and cognitive abilities (Alzheimer or other dementia); loss of independence and autonomy; loss of a loved one; elder abuse (physical, psychological, sexual, neglect and financial abuse) and other distressing life events.
What are some disorders associated with late-life challenges?
Stress; fear (phobia); anxiety, panic; depression; difficulty sleeping; memory lapses; grief; post-traumatic stress; pain (associated with psychological and/or medical conditions); difficulty adjusting to change and low self-esteem.
When not attended to, such feelings can lead to chronic conditions or disorders that can cause or accelerate deterioration in the mental and physical health of the aging person, detrimentally affecting the quality and longevity of her/his life.
What do I do to help?
I work closely with the suffering person, in collaboration with her or his caregiver(s), health care and well-being professionals (subject to confidentiality release by the client). I offer support, counselling and therapy to help individuals alleviate, cope and overcome over-burdening feelings, improve overall everyday functioning and in turn, enhance mental health, well-being, quality of life and longevity.
Optimizing positive aging experience
I offer preventative and enhancement counselling, psycho-education, and coaching
to healthy, well-functioning older persons, who aspire to optimize their mental and emotional fitness and live their lives to the fullest.
Helping With Caregiver’s Distress
Who are the people I see?
Persons who hold the prime responsibility of caring for a physically or psychologically dependent loved one.
A caregiver can be an aging spouse – often with her/his own health problems; a mid-life daughter or son; a granddaughter or grandson; or any other close family member, who in addition to the caregiving demands, are often also responsible for their own family, their work or school, their socialization, and their self care needs.
What are some of the issues facing caregivers?
Distress experienced by caregivers can be associated with over-stretching responsibilities; ineffective prioritizing and time management; insufficient social interaction; debilitating feelings of being ineffective or unappreciated, shame, guilt and anger - often complicated by unfinished business from the past; low self-esteem and loss of self-identity.
What are some of the risks associated with caregiving?
Continuous physical, mental and emotional stress often puts the caregiver at risk of exhaustion, burnout, anxiety, depression and post traumatic stress.
What do I do to help?
Working closely together with the distressed caregiver, I help alleviate over-burdening feelings of grief, anxiety, depression and other disabling feelings; recover self-esteem; re-construct self-defeating identity traits; find respite from the distressing aspects of the caregiving experience and improve overall and everyday functioning.
Caregiving can be a satisfying and rewarding experience.
I help caregivers regain balance in their life; cope with multiple responsibilities; improve the quality of care they give; enhance relationship with their loved one and delay, or altogether eliminate the need for a long term care facility.
Helping Persons in Their Mid-life Deal with Distressing Turning Points in the Lives of Their Aging Parents and Subsequent Inter-Generational Family Issues.
Who are the people I see?
Mid-life children of aging parents who shoulder the bulk of the responsibility for their family and who are facing difficulties in coping with distressing family dynamics triggered or caused by critical turning points in their family’s lives.
What life events can cause or trigger distressing family dynamics?
As parents grow older and face some difficult turning points in their lives, the lives of their children and grandchildren also undergo critical transformations.
Some of the more common turning points are:
A difficult retirement; re-location; late life divorce; grown-up children moving out or moving back in; grandparenthood; re-marriages; job loss; job change; illness in parents; the beginning of caregiving; dependency on the health care system; death of a parent – first and second; settlement of estate; widowhood; death of a sibling, or one’s own illness.
What are some of the risks associated with distressing family dynamics?
Stressful dynamics can trigger or cause anxiety, depression, grief, anger, guilt, shame and other feelings that often undermine family members’ ability to optimally function within the family and in other critical areas of their lives.
What do I do to help?
Crises, dilemmas and facing difficult decisions revive old issues that now require new skills and higher levels of tolerance for differences.