There are many times when it feels like it is imperative to make a change for safety or financial security. However, so often those transitions are so difficult to manage most often because the individual who is impacted doesn’t recognize the change needs to be made.
Waiting is the hardest part.
I have learned that patience and perseverance win the day. After living through forced transitions and the aftermath of emotions and anger when I was living through this with my parents, I found my shift to softer and supportive worked best.
Yes, working in tandem and going at a slower pace take more time. However, imagine if you were on the other side of the equation, isn’t that what you would want?
We arrive as caregivers with a variety of different baggage. The person that is living with cognitive impairment and dementia will have a harder time changing, so the reality is that this falls to the loved ones and support around the individual.
I am working with a client now who knows she has memory issues and a dementia diagnosis, but believes that she can manage the finances just fine on her own. To help, I’m building a monthly schedule to help her and asking the friendly visitor to put due dates on the calendar to remind her to get the bills paid. We will confirm in the background that the bills she needs to pay did indeed get paid.
I work with father/daughter team and over the holidays, the dad finally resigned as Trustee. We have had to fight predatory home service companies and this summer walked in to find a hacker had control of his computer and was starting to transfer money out of his bank account. Thankfully we stopped it in time, but then we spent nearly six months cleaning up the aftermath of the account and credit freezes we put into place. However, his daughter respected how much this meant to him and never pushed him. Over the course of the past two years, she has gently and kindly reminded him of the issues and on this visit, he finally agreed it was time to make the transition.
I know everyone doesn’t have the support and resources that some of my clients have, but I believe there are still ways to reconsider the threat and find ways to support your loved. Got an issue? I’m happy to help. Sending an email to me at Info@MemoryBanc.com. Supported.