Communicating a Diagnosis to Family Members
From time to time, caregivers have questions about the best way to communicate the diagnosis of a loved one to other family members. Indeed, news of a diagnosis can be unsettling and disturbing to family members, so such a situation should be handled with care. Because every individual handles news differently, a blanket answer will not suffice here. Some individuals—no matter what the news—will seem to respond calmly. However, other individuals may show an intense expression of emotions. They may even have outbursts. This is especially true when it comes to young children, as they may not be able to fully comprehend the meaning of the diagnosis.
That said, however, caregivers should bear in mind that children shouldn’t be denied the truth. While they may not be able to comprehend the full extent of a diagnosis’s implications, children deserve to know what’s affecting their loved one. As such, caregivers should do everything they can to communicate the situation with their loved one in a way that children and other young family members comprehend. If you don’t feel capable or comfortable having this conversation with your younger family members, then you may want to consider having someone else—whom the child trusts—have this conversation. You may even wish to speak with a counselor about how to best address the matter. Finally, should you have any questions—especially those questions concerning how news of a diagnosis might affect other members of your family—you may wish to contact an Ohio elder attorney.
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LinkedInThe Importance of Routine in Your Loved One’s Day to Day Life
Routine plays an extremely important role in the day-to-day well being of your loved one. As Alzheimer’s disease progresses and impairs your loved one’s memory—preventing him or her from remembering basic things (such as names, faces, and even favorite places)—your loved one may experience elevated levels of stress or frustration.
A series of daily routines may ease your loved one’s stress levels by providing him or her with a degree of certainty in a world that’s often riddled with anxiety and uncertainty. For instance, if your loved one typically drinks watches a favorite television show, eats a bowl of ice-cream, or drinks a glass of water before going to bed, then you may wish to continue that ritual. Likewise, if your loved one sits on the patio each morning while drinking tea or reading a newspaper, then you’ll want to allow him or her to keep that routine to decrease an overabundance of anxiety about what the day may bring.
While routines are important, you’ll want to make sure your loved one’s daily schedule doesn’t get so full that performing the ritual—or missing the ritual—doesn’t increase his or her stress levels. For instance, if your loved one misses a television show or if you forget to do a daily routine with your loved on at a specific time—such as folding laundry—then you should do your best to simply focus on the next daily routine. Likely, with all the changes occurring in your lives, you’ll miss a ritual here or there, so you may find that a good approach to schedules and routines is to remain flexible so you can focus on attending to your loved one’s needs.
Uncommunicated Pain: a Vicious Emotional Cycle
Communication plays a tremendously important role in day to day life. Consider that when any of us experience anxiety, frustration, or aches and pain, we have the ability to communicate these feelings to our friends and loved ones to get the help we need. Many of us take the ability to communicate our needs for granted—failing to consider how the onset of a condition could significantly impair or even prevent us from acquiring basic needs. Sadly, those diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease or dementia don’t always have the ability to communicate their feelings—and especially their pains. Your loved one could easily find him or herself suffering from a blister, bruise, or migraine; however, he or she may not have a way to communicate this pain.
Pain, anxiety, fatigue, depression make up a never-ending cycle for those diagnosed with Alzheimer’s and dementia. An initial ache or pain sets in. Then the symptoms of Alzheimer’s prevent your loved one from understanding what’s causing the pain, and this lack of understanding induces anxiety. The pain and anxiety result in fatigue, and then—of course—the lack of energy to do the things your loved one enjoys leads to depression.
While a medical professional can certainly provide the treatment needed for you loved ones, an Ohio elder attorney can advise you in the event your loved one’s unspoken pain results in an outburst or other risky behavior. For help answering any questions you may have regarding your loved one and the risks associated with uncommunicated pain, you should reach out to an Ohio injury attorney.
Managing Guilt
As a caretaker, you will undoubtedly experience an array of emotions when providing your loved one with day to day care. Some days, you will feel joy and appreciation while other days, you will feel a host of other emotions—emotions that are not necessarily welcome. Negative emotions such as frustration, overwhelm, sorrow, and—especially—guilt crop-up from time to time, and despite your best efforts to stay positive and focus on actions that improve your loved one situations, feelings of guilt may get the best of you.
Caretakers fall into the trap of allowing guilt to get the best of them for many reasons; however, caretakers often feel guilt simply because they attempt the impossible task of taking responsible for everything that happens to their loved ones. For instance, a caretaker may feel guilty because his or her loved one feels depressed because of a new living circumstance. While the caretaker’s loved one may feel depressed, the caretaker would be wrong to take on the responsible for managing the loved one’s emotional states. Caretakers can only do the best they can, and feelings of guilt will do nothing but prevent you from both acknowledging your efforts and focusing on the best possible solution.
Feelings of guilt sometimes arise when other family members get involved. If your loved one is a parent, aunt or uncle, then there’s always the likelihood that another relative—such as one of your siblings—will attempt to make you feel guilty. Should the interactions between you and your loved one’s escalate to a point of concern, then you may want to contact an Ohio elder attorney.
The Medicaid Bomb
Recently, planners have advertised, promoted, and nearly shouted about a type of planning known as VA planning. VA planning plays an extremely important role in determining benefit eligibility. Typically, these types of VA planners—the ones you hear about through advertisements—work to ensure individuals receive the most benefits available to them in as short a time possible. The type of VA planning they offer may seem very attractive at first, as they offer assistance to individuals in the relatively simple process of rearranging estates or giving away assets to qualify individuals for benefits.
While this type of planning may seem like a smart idea initially—and it may work for many folks—issues tend to arise, usually not too far down the road, when individuals become sick, need to move into a nursing home, or—for some other medical reason—suddenly need those Medicaid benefits. This is what’s known as the Medicaid Bomb: when eligibility for one set of benefits may make these individuals ineligible for other needed benefits.
Poor VA planning can have potentially detrimental consequences to the assets of those individuals diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease or dementia, as oftentimes, the costs of providing assisted living or other types of aid can swallow-up many of the once-available benefits. If you or someone you know has considered speaking with a planner to see about qualifying for VA benefits (either through rearranging an estate or moving assets), then you should contact an Ohio elder law attorney. An Ohio elder law attorney can provide you with assistance during the planning process by helping you evaluate what’s in you and your loved one’s best interests.
Effective Communication with Your Loved One
Since Alzheimer’s affects your loved one’s ability to remember words, phrases, and even every day names or faces, you’ll probably want to think about developing a communication style that takes these constraints into consideration. For instance, because your loved one can easily misinterpret words or phrases, to avoid any undue confusion you’ll likely want to speak slowly and clearly, ask one question at a time, and use body language that supports what you’re trying to say. Moreover, as you work out the most effective way of communicating with your loved one, which may be difficult at times, you’ll want to remember that you’re communicating with an individual with a disease and not a diseased individual. Keeping this tip in mind may help you find the patience you need to overcome any frustration that can potentially get in the way of communicating your care and concern.
While one might initially think that the work and especially patience involved in developing an effective communication style seems too taxing, the alternative to developing this strategy can be even more costly. For instance, consider the potential emotional, physical, and financial cost of an outburst from a loved one who’s overwhelmed with frustration due to continued misunderstanding. A fall could result in personal humiliation for your loved one, a trip to the emergency room, and costly medical bills that could eat into an already stretched budget.
Before you take-on all the costs associated with a violent outburst from your loved one, you should consider reaching out to an Ohio elder law attorney to discuss your options. For instance, he or she might be able to provide information that indicates how your loved one’s outburst simply could be the result of a history of poor communication from personnel at an assisted living facility. A qualified elder law attorney may be able to assist you by providing information you hadn’t previously considered that could make a world of difference in your loved one’s future quality of life.
Facts and Figures: Empowering Caregivers with Information
The responsibility of caring for a loved one’s physical, emotional, and mental needs while also tending to his or her financial needs has the potential to be overwhelming. Those providing care for their loved ones who have Alzheimer’s disease or dementia may find comfort in the fact that they’re not alone in their struggle.
According to Alzheimer’s Association (alz.org), approximately 15 million individuals in the United States provide care for those diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease. This figure comes from the annual Facts and Figures report published by Alzheimer’s Association. Part of the reason for this publication, as identified by the Alzheimer’s Association, is to draw attention to the prevalence of issues related to Alzheimer’s care while simultaneously shed light on the burden Alzheimer’s disease and dementia have on individuals, caregivers, the government, and the national healthcare system. In other words, information in the report includes data that reveals that the financial effects of the disease not only on individuals but on society as a whole.
With regard to the financial effects, according to the report, these 15 million caregivers provide 17 billion hours of unpaid labor at an estimated value of $202 billion annually. With regard to the prevalence of issues, the report sheds light on some seemingly untold aspects of care giving. One such aspect is that while most people understand that caregivers deal with emotional stress, not everyone understands that caregivers also experience a high level of physical stress too. This physical stress often results in higher than average annual healthcare costs for caregivers—an acknowledgement that may make caregivers feel somewhat less alone as they do their best to care for their families.
The information provided by the Alzheimer’s Associate in their annual report shows that the cost of care giving affects not only your loved one but you as well. As such, you’ll want to make sure you’re doing everything within your means to make the best plan possible for the future. In order to protect the assets of both you and your loved one, you should seriously consider reaching out to an elder care attorney as soon as possible. An elder law attorney has the resources and skills necessary to advise you as you seek to reduce potentially wasted assets due to—what otherwise may be considered—Ignorance of the law.
Positive Personality Changes
As you read studies on Alzheimer’s disease and spend more time around individuals who’ve had the condition for extended periods of time, you may start to wonder how your loved one’s personality may (or may not) be affected as the disease progresses. Since many individuals with Alzheimer’s disease do undergo changes in personality and temperament, have every reason for concern. Unfortunately, some of these changes are for the worse, and the new personality or characteristics that emerge may make living situations increasingly stressful for you or other caregivers.
Changes in personality, however, don’t always result in negative or overly stressful living situations. In some instances, individuals with Alzheimer’s disease end-up better adjusted than they may have been prior to onset of the disease. While this may seem like an absurd suggestion initially, and certainly no one wishes for a loved one to develop this terrible disease, there are those individuals with previously diagnosed personality disorders whose mental stability and general behavior markedly improve. For instance, individuals who’ve been alcoholics for years will occasionally begin to stop drinking because they simply forget to do so. Consequently, they experience some general improvements in physical health and all the benefits that come along with those improvements.
While a few people may find that their loved one’s personality improves slightly because of a condition such as Alzheimer’s disease or dementia, not everyone is so lucky. If you have concern that the disease has affected your loved one to the extent that his or her behavior seems erratic or even dangerous, then you may want to seek the advice of a qualified Ohio elder law attorney. While you may not have an immediate need to address, keeping yourself informed of your options and how those options relate to the law may be key in averting issues that may arise further down the road.
Types of Wandering
Individuals with Alzheimer’s disease often engage in behavior that strike outside observers as peculiar. Luckily, these peculiar behaviors, by and large, are completely harmless and do not pose a safety concern. Sometimes though, a behavior can lead a loved far away from home and into circumstances that may but him or her in harm’s way. Wandering, for instance, is one of those types of behaviors that can easily fall into the category of “potentially harmful.”
With wandering, a loved one can—when unsupervised—begin walking somewhere and forget where they’re heading. Your loved one may do this for a number of reasons, though, generally, they’re doing so because one of the symptoms of Alzheimer’s disease is disorientation. Because wandering can result in stressful, frightening, and even dangerous situations, you may want to take a moment to familiarize yourself with a few common types of wandering.
The Mayo Clinic provides an excellent description of the different types of wandering. One example of wandering is searching. With searching, your loved one may start searching for something (e.g., food or water) or someone (e.g., a best friend) but forget what it is he or she is trying to find. Another example wandering is trying to escape from something. Sometimes your loved one may feel overwhelmed with stress or anxiety and consequently, he or she will attempt to move away from the source of tension. Unfortunately, though, individuals become disoriented and completely forget what it is that was bothering them. Another type of wandering occurs when your loved one attempts to relive the past. In such cases, an individual may repeat the same behavior or activity at the same time every day.
To ensure your loved one returns safely to you or to ensure you’ve prepared you and your loved ones for that worst case scenario, you may want to go ahead and take a few precautions. For instance, you may want to go ahead and enroll him or her in the Alzheimer’s Association’s “Safe Return” program shortly after a doctor diagnoses him or her with the disease. Another measure you can take to ensure your prepared is to go ahead and reach out to an Ohio elder law attorney. While this may initially seem like an unnecessary precaution to take with regard to your loved one, the unfortunate reality is that accidents do happen and you and your loved ones are always better off being prepared.
Estate Planning Documents and Asset Protection
News and announcements made over the last few years concerning healthcare suggest that obtaining government benefits in the future may be more difficult than they have been in the past. As such, you may want to be extra cautious when estate planning and drafting a financial power of attorney. Taking that extra little bit of caution can make tremendous difference when it comes to protecting your assets.
Despite best efforts for proper estate planning, people encounter unforeseen issues as a result of emerging medical conditions. For instance, an individual may leave remaining assets to his or her spouse; however, the surviving spouse then develops a serious condition such as Alzheimer’s disease. Consequently, all those assets will end-up paying for the cost of long-term care and the surviving spouse may not be eligible to receive full benefits. The good news, though, is that those wills can be amended, so if the surviving spouse develops Alzheimer’s, then the assets pass down to the children so they may ensure proper care of their parent.
That said, estate planning documents are extremely important documents with regard to preserving assets. This is especially true of power of attorney documents. As such, you should make sure you obtain a power of attorney from a qualified elder attorney to draft a strong document and not just download a power of attorney document that you found somewhere on the internet. While these internet, ready-made documents provide individuals with some basic information they need to understand power of attorney, the document’s strength and durability has not yet been tested. Another document that you will need is a revocable living trust. While the document itself does not protect assets, it does serve as a probate avoidance vehicle that ensures assets can be channeled directly where they’re needed most.
The time to plan for the future is now, and if you’re already reading this, then you should go ahead and reach out to a qualified Ohio elder attorney. An experienced elder attorney can help you with planning your estate by drafting a power of attorney document that anticipates scenarios you may not have ever considered.