Financial planning is important for the later years. As a person gets older they tend to need more medical care due to the illnesses and accidents they encounter. The cost of healthcare is extremely expensive especially to an elderly person who is on a limited budget. My grandparents saved a lot of money during their working years. My grandfather also worked for the same company his entire working life and received a good retirement package. My grandparents are always cutting coupons and looking for deals when it comes to saving money. The have encountered some health issues which was costly to them. Companies don’t take care of their people with benefits like they used to. Social security is supposed to be gone once my age group retires. With that being said, I’m not sure how my generation is going to survive once we retire. It shows how important it is to start saving at an early age in order to live a comfortable retirement. I would like to travel and enjoy my last years of life rather than be struggling financially.
Monday, May 2, 2011
Recommendation #4: Encourage your parent to talk about events and memories from the past
This is a good recommendation. Anytime we are around our grandma, all she does is talk about her past experiences and memories of people in our family. I wish she would record them or write them down because they are very entertaining. Even if some of the stories are embellished, they are never boring. I agree with the manuscript that by showing interest and listening to elders stories, it makes them feel important and gives them attention. My mother gets tired of hearing the same stories at times but never says anything to my grandmother about it. If my grandma is enjoying herself by telling us these memories then that is all that is important.
My other grandmother was not such a story teller, when she was alive she would stay in the present moment in conversations. My grandmothers have different personalities and I have/had very different relationships with them.
Recommendation #28: Wean a person over time from depending solely on you for transportation
Transportation is independence and freedom to a person. Loosing that can be very traumatic. When I worked in the pharmacy I remember elderly people that would take cabs to come pick up their medications or they would rely on family members to help. I personally know how this feels. I lost my company care when I got laid off as a pharmaceutical represented. I had given my personal car to my sister years before. It took about a month to find the right car for me in my budget. During that month it was hard relying on my boyfriend for rides or borrowing his truck. When I finally found a car, I felt so liberated and decided that I would always own a personal car. I think that in the manuscript that the family handled the situation right by hiring someone to be on call to give the mother a ride when need be. I think just the idea and feeling that the mother can leave the house when she wanted probably gave her some peace.
Recommendation #1: Respond to anger and frustration with empathy rather than with endless questions and/or answers
Frustration and fear is a natural thing that a person may feel with aging. As a person ages they experience metal and physical challenges. I used to work in a pharmacy and I dealt with many frustrated elderly people. Most of them had a tight budget which they have to live off of. Some of the patients had to rely on others for transportation. All these things can impact a person’s attitude. I had many elderly patients that would forget what medications they needed to fill or how to take them. It was very scary and concerning for me to see elderly patients mistaking their medications out of confusion. My grandparents are getting older and my family has some concerns about them driving far distances. I’m sure if they approach this concern with my grandparents they with become very frustrated. In their minds they are perfectly capable of driving anyplace they choose. I agree in the manuscript that if anger or frustration is directed towards you from an elderly person, the best thing to do is stay calm. I would always handle patients this way and they would normally calm down and feel bad for acting out in an unhealthy way.
Recommendation #7: Develop an end of life plan with the active input of one’s parent
This part of the manuscript addresses the importance of including a loved one in the decisions of where to be laid to rest and how their estate should be handled once they pass. This is a difficult but necessary thing to do. When something is said out loud then it because a reality therefore I can understand how hard it was for the mother to have to talk about this topic. I think it is very important to carry out ones wishes out of respect for that person. I agree with the manuscript that preplanning a person’s death is important because that person has a say in what they want done and the family doesn’t have to do anything but grieve once the person passes. My family did this before my grandma died. She has a funeral in Orlando and in Cleveland where she had spent most of her life. My grandma is laid to rest next to her son who had passed away a few years before hand. In the same cemetery, my great grandparents are buried. It was extremely important for my grandmother to go back home to rest. My grandmother picked out specific things she wanted each of her grandchildren to have and the rest of her estate to be liquidized. My other grandparents have already had these discussions with family member’s and have a will in place to make sure their wishes are carried out.
Thursday, January 13, 2011
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