Resources to Read
We have and will continue to curate a collection of books and web sites that will be useful in your quest for more information about caregiving – caring for both your loved one, and caring for yourself. We also post a lot of informations on Twitter, LinkedIn , Facebook, and YouTube, so you might find it very informative and helpful to follow us there as well.
Books - Caregiving and Elder Care
The books listed below are some of the best and most popular books to read to help better understand caregiving, how to be better, more patient, compassionate, and enduring, how to survive, both during and after, and likewise to understand the unique challenges that come with advanced age – whereas caregiving may occur with our children, partners or parents, there is a unique dynamic that exists in elder care for our parents.
Caregiver
Life Giving Dementia Care
Let’s Talk: How to Bring Confidence, Compassion and Joy Into Your Role as a Caregiver
If someone you love has Dementia or Alzheimer’s, and you’re their caregiver, what do you do? Where can you get help and what should you do first? Can you provide care at home, or will you need to choose a care facility? What if you make mistakes and hurt them instead of help? What about the cost – do they have the resources to pay for care? And your family, friends, or employer – will they understand the new demands on your time and support you, or will everything fall apart? Can you really do this?
If questions like these fill your head, this book is for you!
Recommended by AlzAuthors.com, Life Giving Dementia Care guides you to be a confident, compassionate caregiver for your loved one and for yourself. It’s like you’re chatting with a friend who has “been there and done that,” candidly sharing their own fears, pain, joys, and lessons learned as a caregiver. Part how-to, part memoir, this dementia caregiver guide shows you step-by-step what to expect and how to plan from early symptoms and diagnosis through estate settlement as you and your loved one are dealing with dementia. Inside, you’ll learn about:
- Understanding and recognizing symptoms & diagnosis
- How to be the best caregiver you can be
- Medical, legal & financial planning
- Taking care of yourself
- How to add skilled care professionals
- At-Home, hospice & end-of-life decisions
- Settling the estate
- How to heal yourself after caregiving ends
…and so much more!
Sometimes poignant, sometimes laugh out loud funny, Life Giving Dementia Care will help you develop confidence, strengthen your compassion and lead you to find joy in this tough journey called caregiving. With patience, understanding, and a dedicated support community…Yes, you can do this!
Caregiver
The Reluctant Caregiver
Making Peace With an Imperfect Parent
Just because a parent needs care does not negate or erase their hurtful actions of the past. It intensifies them and drudges up painful memories.
It is no easy task to deal with the day-to-day demands of taking care of someone else. It is even more challenging serving and sacrificing for a parent whose presence is associated with everything you are trying to avoid. The Reluctant Caregiver addresses the inner conflict unique to those who are or were caregivers for a parent with whom they still have issues.
Psychotherapist Karen Oke shares her personal and spiritual journey of processing through her painful past as well as the experiences of others who dealt with the conflict of caregiving. In this book, you will gain insight on how to:
- Deal with the guilt and frustration of taking care of a parent you don’t like being around
- Work through the anger of feeling forced to take care of a parent who didn’t properly care for you
- Escape emotional manipulation by setting appropriate boundaries in place
- Find a way to live your best life despite the demands of caregiving
- Free yourself from the prison of emotional pain by gently processing through your past to find peace
Sometimes the caregiving situation “is what it is.” But there are ways you can become better instead of bitter. Get practical principles that you can apply to your own life that will assist you in your role as a caregiver and, more importantly, in taking care of yourself.
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Who are the caregivers? We all are, for at the heart of being human is the capacity to care, to reach out to others and explore the relationships we build. The Soul of Caregiving is about us and how we, as caregivers, serve, even sacrifice, for those in need. I invite you to explore with me how we have the opportunities to partake in a kind of pilgrimage along the path of our experiences as caregivers. Who will be your guide on this journey? Unlike other pilgrims who have a guide assigned to them, you will soon discover it is your own Soul guiding you. Professionally skilled as we may be to meet the needs of others, a fundamental core component of our busy lives as caregivers, is the necessity to stop and rest. It is not a waste of time, but rather a luxury of time, to ponder, reflect, and grow from our experiences. Not an easy endeavor in the midst of a whirlwind of activity. We, as caregivers, experience vulnerability, helplessness, fears, and pain over the traumatic events we experience because we care. We care about those whom we are called to serve. Compassion fatigue comes about because we care.
In Chapter One, I call this tension between activity and reflection, “the Dance of Caregiving,” a dance between the caregiver’s needs and those of the one in need. The chapter is an introduction to exploring something we do every day: to reflect on our experiences. Chapter Two, “Reclaiming Soul,” asks the question, “What is Soul?” and how is the caregiver empowered and sustained. Discovering Soul implies going deeper into the inner caverns of our being and listening to the inner beats of our heart where insight and wisdom abide. “Once Upon a Time in the Land of OZ,” Chapter Three, explores the universal underpinnings of the role of caregiving, as each profession exists in the broader mythic and archetypal realm of a culture.
In Chapter Four, “Truce or Consequences,” both the mythos and logos of caregiving are explored. Each relates to faithless science and unscientific faith, leading to a unity of the left and right brain functions. “The Ins and Outs of Hospitality,” in Chapter Five, discusses how the caregiver, as host, experiences three different dimensions of hospitality: the caregiver who hosts the stranger, the caregiver who hosts his or her reactions and experiences, and thirdly, the caregiver who welcomes the stories of the guests they host. Chapter Six, “Love is a Wounded Healer,” addresses an ancient question of the frailty of humankind. There is within each of us a space that seeks wholeness and transformation, an area of woundedness which often shows its face in the midst of our caregiving. In a unique and profound way, those who serve are transformed in the healing relationship that is created with those in need. We are wounded healers.
“Cultivating the Soul’s Garden,” Chapter Seven, addresses the art of reflection as a fundamental skill for caregivers. An understanding of Soul implies allowing the moment to take root and to reflect on how to nourish and sustain ourselves as caregivers. Chapter Eight focuses on “Spirituality: The Sinew of Human Experience” where imagination helps one discover meaning, arguing that the essential actions of a caregiver are spiritual. In Chapter Nine “Practice, Practice, Practice” I explore what a practice is and how caregiving is a spiritual practice. The ordinary becomes spiritual, as inner strengths and values give birth to meaning, insight, and transformation. The Soul of Caregiving concludes with Chapter Ten, “Warning: Our Tank is Almost Empty” which explores compassion fatigue and its two sisters, secondary traumatic stress and burnout. We experience compassion fatigue because we care. We look at how to recognize the warning signs, take action to avoid them, and learn how to recover from them in building compassion resilience.
Caregiver
Toolkit for Caregivers
Tips, Skills, and Wisdom to Maximise Your Time Together
If you are one of the millions of people who have become a caregiver to a loved one, Toolkit will guide you through that maze of caregiving concerns that threaten to overwhelm and consume you.
Toolkit for Caregivers will very quickly become your go-to guide for:
- How to set up a caregiving environment
- Skills in patient care that are clearly explained for family members to understand
- Tips/tricks/hacks to make your loved one/patient more comfortable in a home hospital bed and you a more confident caregiver
- Resources for getting supplemental help
- Advice on personal coping concerns and techniques for the caregiver
- Understanding Home Health and Hospice Care
- Maximizing moments together with your loved one/patient so caregiving does not take over
Love Lives Here – Toolkit for Caregiver Survival will guide you through the following steps:
- What ALL people, regardless of age, can do to make family life transitions go smoother through a process of focused, loving considerations and having The Conversation – talking points included
- What you may expect and how you can prepare yourself in advance for walking through the emotional concerns of death and dying.
- What to do after the funeral – the Business Side of Dying checklist
- Coping with the unique kind of grief caregivers experience
- Personal growth opportunities and a daily perspective for your new reality
Deidre Edwards shares the inside story of how to give care, AND how to survive the emotional ups and downs, in this unique double-offering of practical insights and proven skills. She has walked this path and shares her valuable experience; she is with you even after your caregiving journey is over.
From the end of life planning, caregiver stress, taking care of the dying, and dealing with loss and grief – it’s all covered in this two-book bundle. Smooth your caregiving route, prepare for unforeseen issues, and discover the help that is available.
Most of us will become caregivers at some point; learn what’s ahead and how to best prepare ourselves and our family
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When Caregiving Calls
Guidance as You Care for a Parent, Spouse, or Aging Relative
WINNER–2020 Best Indie Book Awards, Non-Fiction: Caregiving
“Expert Aaron Blight explores the daily realities of caregiving and offers candid, practical advice to help family caregivers cope with their many challenges. . . . This outstanding guide will be a lifesaver for anyone saddled with these immense responsibilities and seeking peace of mind.”—BookLife Reviews (Editor’s Pick)
“Candid, compassionate, and comforting caregiving advice.”—Kirkus Reviews
Caring for a parent, spouse, or relative who cannot care for themselves due to age, infirmity, or illness is one of the noblest human activities. It’s also one of the most stressful, posing challenges that can be painful, confusing, frustrating, and deeply rewarding—sometimes all at once. When Caregiving Calls is an invitation to a deep conversation about caregiving and its meaning for you.
Aaron Blight has lived the caregiving experience many ways—as a family caregiver for a mother-in-law struggling with a brain tumor and cancer as they stole her mental clarity and ultimately her life; as the owner of a home care company that supported thousands of families living their own versions of the same journey; and as a researcher, lecturer, and consultant traveling the world to learn from family caregivers and their professional helpers.
Now he shares his insights in eighteen brief, thoughtful chapters that examine the many facets of caregiving. He explores how caregiving reshapes family relationships, challenges comfortable assumptions, and stresses your ability to manage your time, energy, and emotions. He shows how the changing mental and physical state of a loved one can lead to growing vulnerability, need, and loneliness on the part of care receiver and caregiver alike. He shares stories—poignant, funny, and often inspiring—that vividly capture the unique daily realities of the caregiving life. And he offers candid, practical advice that can help family caregivers do a better job of coping with the physical, psychological, social, and spiritual challenges they face.
“This book is an important road map from one who has journeyed as both a family caregiver and a professional caregiver. His guidance can help others have the best chance to survive and maybe even thrive while carrying the burden of caregiving.”—Martin J. Schreiber, former Governor of Wisconsin and author of My Two Elaines: Learning, Coping, and Surviving as an Alzheimer’s Caregiver
“This easy-to-read book provides family caregivers with valuable insights, guidance, and affirmation that reflect empathy and respect for their role. Dr. Blight’s poignant stories will help both family caregivers and the professionals and other family members who support them.”—Rhonda J. V. Montgomery, PhD, internationally recognized expert on family caregiving
“No family caregiver should be without this book. In clear and concise chapters, it covers all the topics caregivers need to understand the journey they are on and provides a reference source to be revisited again and again.”—Robert Mastrogiovanni, President, Well Spouse Association
“When Caregiving Calls is written with passion and wisdom. Aaron Blight provides us with reassurance and hope as we better understand the role of caregiver. Personal and professional caregivers, this a must-read!”—Jennifer T. Martin, RN, certified hospice and palliative nurse, Chief Nursing Officer, Blue Ridge Hospice
“When Caregiving Calls is a masterpiece—a well-written book that highlights the author’s personal experience of caring for a loved one, which was a changing point in his life. Readers of every background all over the world can learn a lot from Aaron Blight’s captivating work.”—Charles Senessie, MD, MSc, PhD, Founder and President, Afro-European Medical and Research Network
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The Emotional Survival Guide for Caregivers
Looking After Yourself and Your Family While Helping an Aging Parent
Caring for a parent whose health is in decline turns the world upside down. The emotional fallout can be devastating, but it doesn’t have to be that way. Empathic guidance from an expert who’s been there can help. Through an account of two sisters and their ailing mother–interwoven with no-nonsense advice–The Emotional Survival Guide for Caregivers helps family members navigate tough decisions and make the most of their time together as they care for an aging parent. The author urges readers to be honest about the level of commitment they’re able to make and emphasizes the need for clear communication within the family. While acknowledging their guilt, stress, and fatigue, he helps caregivers reaffirm emotional connections worn thin by the routine of daily care. This compassionate book will help families everywhere avoid burnout and preserve bonds during one of life’s most difficult passages.
Caregiver
The Caregiving Wife’s Handbook
Caring for Your Seriously Ill Husband, Caring for Yourself
A month after proposing marriage, Diana Denholm’s husband was diagnosed with colon cancer and later congestive heart failure. Following a heart transplant, several of her husband’s body systems began failing; forcing Diana to become his primary caregiver for more than a decade. The Caregiving Wife’s Handbook is a step-by-step communication guide to help women maintain emotional, physical, and financial health in their unique role as caregivers to their dying husbands.
Caregiver
Chicken Soup for the Caregiver’s Soul
Stories to Inspire Caregivers in the Home, Community and the World (Chicken Soup for the Soul)
Whether you’ve chosen caregiving as a profession or caregiving has chosen you, your daily commitment and sacrifice are true testaments to the human spirit. These true, inspirational stories offer you a respite from your responsibilities, bringing uplifting and comforting insights to fill you with renewed hope, courage and strength.
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My Parent’s Keeper
The Guilt, Grief, Guesswork, and Unexpected Gifts of Caregiving
When it comes time to provide care for those who once cared for us, where can we turn? This book offers practical guidance for a broad range of caregiving situations when family caregivers assume their new role.
- Uses the latest research and draws on case histories and interviews.
- Is a resource as well as a source of inspiration, with a blend of powerful stories and practical advice.
- Helps caregivers cope with numerous challenges, including parents who need but refuse help; siblings who don’t get along; the complexity of healthcare systems; financial issues; juggling work and caregiving; the use of technology; the power of connecting with a loved one who has dementia; and realizing the benefits amid the burdens of caregiving.
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How to Care for Aging Parents, 3rd Edition
A One-Stop Resource for All Your Medical, Financial, Housing, and Emotional Issues
The book that answers all the questions you hoped you’d never have to ask.
Hailed as “an excellent resource” by the Family Caregiver Alliance, How to Care for Aging Parents is an indispensable source of information and support.
Now completely revised and updated, this compassionate, comprehensive caregiver’s bible tackles all the touch subjects, from how to avoid becoming your parent’s “parent,” to understanding what happens to the body in old age, to getting help finding, and paying for, a nursing home.
When love is not enough—and regrettably, it never is—this is the essential guide.
Help for every difficult issue:
- Knowing when to intervene
- Coping with dementia
- Caring for the caregiver
- The question of driving
- Paying for long-term care
- Sharing the care with siblings
- Caregiving from a distance
- Home care vs. a nursing home
- The hospice option
Death and Dying
A Beginner’s Guide to the End
How to Live Life to the Full and Die a Good Death
“I wish I’d had this book when I needed it. Death and dying are not subjects that many people are comfortable talking about, but it’s hugely important to be as prepared as you can be – emotionally, physically, practically, financially, and spiritually. This book may be the most important guide you could have.” – Elizabeth Gilbert, author of Eat Pray Love
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The end of a life can often feel like a traumatic, chaotic and inhuman experience. In this reassuring and inspiring book, palliative care physician Dr BJ Miller and writer Shoshana Berger provide a vision for rethinking and navigating this universal process.
There are plenty of self-help books for mourners, but nothing in the way of a modern, approachable and above all useful field guide for the living. And all of us – young, old, sick and well – could use the help. After all, pregnant couples have ample resources available to them as they prepare to bring a new life into the world: Lamaze courses, elaborate birth plans, tons of manuals. Why don’t we have a What to Expect When You’re Expecting to Die book?
An accessible, beautifully designed and illustrated companion, A Beginner’s Guide to the End offers a clear-eyed and compassionate survey of the most pressing issues that come up when one is dying, and will bring optimism and practical guidance to empower readers with the knowledge, resources and tools they’ll need to die better, maybe even with triumph.
Caregiver
Caregiver’s Survival Guide
Caring for Yourself While Caring for a Loved One
Caregiver’s Survival Guide is based on Dr. Robert Yonover’s personal experiences. While struggling to become a successful scientist and inventor, he also was primary caregiver for his paralyzed wife for more than twenty years and raised their two children. Yonover takes you into the throes of his life as a caregiver, husband, and father, offering guidance and hope through his story. He provides advice on:
- Dealing with heavy news
- Handling day-to-day challenges
- Holding on to the foundation of your relationship
- Taking stock of finances
- Adapting and enjoying life
- Staying sane
- Maintaining a social life
- Fighting for your rights
Through Caregiver’s Survival Guide, Dr. Yonover will equip other caregivers who face similar physical, mental, social, and financial challenges with tips and guidelines from his own experiences and other experts to help make their situation survivable.
Caregiver, Planning
The Complete Eldercare Planner, Revised and Updated Edition
Where to Start, Which Questions to Ask, and How to Find Help
As our population shifts and ages, the care needs for our elders continue to change and evolve. Today’s generation of family and professional caregivers faces new decisions and challenges, as well as previously unavailable options. This thoroughly revised and updated 2009 edition of The Complete Eldercare Planner equips you with reliable, up-to-the-minute information to help you plan and manage caring for your loved ones.
Comprehensive and detailed, sensitive and realistic, practical and accessible, the 2009 edition provides even more tips on prioritizing and organizing caregiving tasks, balancing work and family responsibilities, and navigating the complex maze of eldercare services. In addition to an expanded index of Internet resources and access to downloadable forms of key documents, you’ll find indispensable checklists, worksheets, step-by-step action plans, lists of questions to ask, low-cost and free alternative resources, and The Document Locator™. This new edition covers:
•Getting started on creating a long-term care plan
•Finding help, especially if you live far away
•Managing the financial aspects
•Talking to elders about sensitive subjects
•Senior housing–move or stay put?
•Managing medications
•And many other topics of vital interest to anyone caring for an elder
Caregiver, Planning
BA/AARP Checklist for My Family
A Guide to My History, Financial Plans and Final Wishes
‘Putting our life in order’ is one of those emotionally-charged milestones many of us would like to put off as long as possible. But whenever you do decide to make this happen, either for yourself or a loved one, you will be off to a great start with this valuable new resource from AARP and the American Bar Association. Checklist for My Family guides you through the process of gathering in one place your finances, legal documents, online accounts, wishes about medical care, and more. Plus it tells you what you need, why you need it, what’s missing, and where to get it.
While giving you peace of mind, this book is also a gift to your loved ones. It spares them stressful decisions and needless frustrations when you’re ill or upon your death. And it presents them with your legacy, by providing specific knowledge of family history and recollections about your life, interests, and accomplishments.
Whether you choose to gather this critical information in the book itself or through the forms available free online, you can easily customize and organize your information.
With this one-of-a-kind guide, you’ll stay in control of your life and feel satisfied in knowing that if anything happens to you, you—and your family—will be well prepared.
Caregiver, Elder Care
They’re Your Parents Too!
How Siblings Can Survive Their Parents’ Aging Without Driving Each Other Crazy
Your parents are growing older and are getting forgetful, starting to slow down, or worse. Suddenly you find yourself at the cusp of one of the most important transitions in your life—and the life of your family. Your parents need you and your siblings to step up and take care of them, a little or a lot. To make the right things happen, you will all need to work together. And yet your siblings may have very different ideas from yours of what’s best for Mom and Dad. They may be completely uninterested in helping, leaving you with all the responsibility. Or they may take charge and not allow you to help, or criticize whatever help you do give. Will you and your siblings be able to reach an understanding and work together, or will the challenges you face tear you apart?
Most of us enter this period of our lives unprepared for the difficult decisions and delicate negotiations that lie ahead. This is the first book that provides guidance on the transition from the “old” family to the “new” one, especially for adult siblings. Here you’ll find practical advice on a wide range of topics including
• Who will make major medical decisions, manage finances, and enforce end-of-life choices if your parents cannot? And how will this be decided and carried out?
• How will you negotiate caregiving issues and deal with unequal contributions or power struggles?
• How can inheritance and the division of property, assets, and personal effects be handled to minimize hurt feelings and resentment?
• How will you cope with the natural reemergence of unresolved childhood rivalries, hurts, and needs?
• How can caring for your parents be an enriching experience rather than a thankless chore?
• Most important, how can you ensure the best care for your parents while lessening conflict, guilt, anger, and angst?
Written by a veteran journalist who chronicles life and how baby boomers live it, They’re Your Parents, Too! offers all the information, insight, and advice you’ll need to make productive choices as you and your siblings begin to assume your parents’ place as the decision-making generation of your family.
Filled with expert guidance from gerontologists, family therapists, elder-care attorneys, financial planners, and health workers; resonant real-life stories; and helpful family negotiation techniques, this is an indispensable book for anyone whose parents are aging.
Caregiver, End of Life
The Art of Dying Well
A Practical Guide to a Good End of Life
This “comforting…thoughtful” (The Washington Post) guide to maintaining a high quality of life—from resilient old age to the first inklings of a serious illness to the final breath—by the New York Times bestselling author of Knocking on Heaven’s Door is a “roadmap to the end that combines medical, practical, and spiritual guidance” (The Boston Globe).
“A common sense path to define what a ‘good’ death looks like” (USA TODAY), The Art of Dying Well is about living as well as possible for as long as possible and adapting successfully to change. Packed with extraordinarily helpful insights and inspiring true stories, award-winning journalist Katy Butler shows how to thrive in later life (even when coping with a chronic medical condition), how to get the best from our health system, and how to make your own “good death” more likely. Butler explains how to successfully age in place, why to pick a younger doctor and how to have an honest conversation with them, when not to call 911, and how to make your death a sacred rite of passage rather than a medical event. This handbook of preparations—practical, communal, physical, and spiritual—will help you make the most of your remaining time, be it decades, years, or months.
Based on Butler’s experience caring for aging parents, and hundreds of interviews with people who have successfully navigated our fragmented health system and helped their loved ones have good deaths, The Art of Dying Well also draws on the expertise of national leaders in family medicine, palliative care, geriatrics, oncology, and hospice. This “empowering guide clearly outlines the steps necessary to prepare for a beautiful death without fear” (Shelf Awareness).Art of Dying Well
Caregiver
The Unexpected Journey of Caring
Personal transformation is usually an experience we actively seek out—not one that hunts us down. Becoming a caregiver is one transformation that comes at us, requiring us to rethink everything we once knew. Everything changes—responsibilities, beliefs, hopes, expectations, and relationships. Caregiving is not just a role reserved for “saints” – eventually, everyone is drafted into the caregiver role. It’s not a role people medically train for; it’s a new type of relationship initiated by a loved one’s need for care. And it’s a role that cannot be quarantined to home because it infuses all aspects of our lives.
Caregivers today find themselves in need of a crash course in new and unfamiliar skills. They must not only care for a loved one, but also access hidden community resources, collaborate with medical professionals, craft new narratives consistent with the changing nature of their care role, coordinate care with family, seek information and peer support using a variety of digital platforms, and negotiate social support—all while attempting to manage conflicts between work, life, and various relationship roles. The moments that mark us in the transition from loved one to caregiver matter because if we don’t make sense of how we are being transformed, we risk undervaluing our care experiences, denying our evolving beliefs, becoming trapped by other’s misunderstandings, and burned out by constantly) feeling underappreciated and overwhelmed.
Informed by original caregiver research and proven advocacy strategies, this book speaks to caregiving as it unfolds, in all of its confusion, chaos, and messiness. Readers won’t find well-intentioned clichés or care stereotypes in this book. There are no promises to help caregivers return to a life they knew before caregiving. No, this book greets caregivers where they are in their journey—new or chronic—not where others expect (or want) them to be.
Caregiver, Alzheimer’s
Ten Thousand Joys & Ten Thousand Sorrows: A Couple’s Journey Through Alzheimer’s
“Ten Thousand Sorrows & Ten Thousand Joys offers a vision of lives well-led, and of love in the thick of crisis and loss. Beyond inspiring.”-Daniel Goleman, author of Emotional Intelligence
“This beautiful book is unlike any other personal account of living with Alzheimer’s disease that I have ever read . . . it offers patients and families practical insights into how they can live their lives more fully amidst the heartbreak of a mind-robbing illness.”- Paul Raia, Director of Patient Care and Family Support, Alzheimer’s Association, Massachusetts Chapter
“A story of courage, love, and growing wisdom in the face of Alzheimer’s.”-Joseph Goldstein, author of One Dharma, Founder / Director of Insight Meditation Society
In this profound and courageous memoir, Olivia Ames Hoblitzelle describes how her husband’s Alzheimer’s diagnosis at the age of seventy-two challenged them to live the spiritual teachings they had embraced during the course of their life together. Following a midlife career shift, Harrison Hobliztelle, or Hob as he was called, a former professor of comparative literature at Barnard, Columbia, and Brandeis University, became a family therapist and was ordained a Dharmacharya (senior teacher) by Thich Nhat Hanh. Hob comes to life in these pages as an incredibly funny and brilliant man who never stopped enjoying a good philosophical conversation-even as his mind, quite literally, slipped away from him. And yet when they first heard the diagnosis, Olivia and Hob’s initial reaction was to cling desperately to the life they had had. But everything had changed, and they knew that the only answer was to greet this last phase of Hob’s life consciously and lovingly.
Ten Thousand Joys & Ten Thousand Sorrows provides a wise and compassionate vision for maintaining hope and grace in the face of life’s greatest challenges.
(This memoir was originally self-published as The Majesty of Your Loving.)
Caregiver
Can’t We Talk about Something More Pleasant?: A Memoir
#1 New York Times Bestseller
2014 National Book Award Finalist
Winner of the inaugural 2014 Kirkus Prize in nonfiction
Winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award
Winner of the 2014 Books for a Better Life Award
Winner of the 2015 Reuben Award from National Cartoonists Society
In her first memoir, New Yorker cartoonist Roz Chast brings her signature wit to the topic of aging parents. Spanning the last several years of their lives and told through four-color cartoons, family photos, and documents, and a narrative as rife with laughs as it is with tears, Chast’s memoir is both comfort and comic relief for anyone experiencing the life-altering loss of elderly parents.
While the particulars are Chast-ian in their idiosyncrasies–an anxious father who had relied heavily on his wife for stability as he slipped into dementia and a former assistant principal mother whose overbearing personality had sidelined Roz for decades–the themes are universal: adult children accepting a parental role; aging and unstable parents leaving a family home for an institution; dealing with uncomfortable physical intimacies; and hiring strangers to provide the most personal care.
An amazing portrait of two lives at their end and an only child coping as best she can, Can’t We Talk about Something More Pleasant shows the full range of Roz Chast’s talent as cartoonist and storyteller.
Caregiver
When the Time Comes: Families with Aging Parents Share Their Struggles and Solutions
What will you do when you get the call that a loved one has had a heart attack or a stroke? Or when you realize that a family member is too frail to live alone, but too healthy for a nursing home?
Journalist Paula Span shares the resonant narratives of several families who faced these questions. Each family contemplates the alternatives in elder care (from assisted living to multigenerational living to home care, nursing care, and at the end, hospice care) and chooses the right path for its needs. Span writes about the families’ emotional challenges, their practical discoveries, and the good news that some of them find a situation that has worked for them and their loved ones. And many find joy in the duty of caring for an older loved one.
There are 45 million Americans caring for family members currently, and as the 77 million boomers continue to age, this number will only go up. Paula Span’s stories are revealing and informative. They give a sense of all the emotional and practical factors that go into the major decisions about caregiving, so that readers will be better able to figure out what to do when the time comes for them and their loved ones.
Caregiver, Assisted Living
Stages of Senior Care: Your Step-by-Step Guide to Making the Best Decisions
A USA Today BESTSELLER!
“Informative. Complete. And practical. This book will guide family caregivers through the surprisingly complex world of senior care.”
―MEHMET OZ, M.D., New York Times bestselling coauthor of YOU: The Owner’s Manual: The Complete All-in-One Care Guide
Choosing the best care for your aging parents and other seniors in your life is not only complex, with multiple options available, it’s also highly personal and often emotional. This essential resource―written by the founders of Home Instead Senior Care, the world’s largest provider of nonmedical care for seniors―guides you through a comprehensive range of things to consider, step by step, so you can make better informed decisions and be confident that the senior in your life is receiving the best care possible. Checklists and diagnostics will help you:
- Decide if at-home care is the right choice for you and your loved ones
- Evaluate the pros and cons of retirement communities, adult care centers, nonmedical caregivers, assisted living facilities, nursing homes, and hospice
- Determine the costs of senior care options and find helpful support networks
“This is not just another book about caring for aging parents. It’s a great reference you’ll use again and again. Stages doesn’t shy away from the hard questions. Rather, it shows you how to confront them.”―SUZANNE MINTZ, President/CEO, National Family Caregivers Association
“Recognizing that there is no one-size-fits-all solution, this salient volume compassionately addresses a full range of hard-to-discuss subjects.”–PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Caregiver, Assisted Living
Assisted living is the fastest-growing alternative to skilled nursing care for frail older persons in the United States. The expectations, settings, and missions of these residences are varied, making it difficult for prospective residents and their families to anticipate what it would be like to live in them. This book is a unique portal into the real world of assisted living and the key issues facing consumers, providers, and policy makers.
Drawing on in-depth interviews with residents, their family members, staffers, and administrators, Inside Assisted Living opens the window on day-to-day life in six different types of assisted living residence. From “Miss Helen at Valley Glen Home” to “Mr. Sidney at Laurel Ridge,” the detailed profiles of individuals show the commonalities among the residences while highlighting the positive and negative aspects of each. The voices of those living, visiting, and working in the homes clarify the important local (social relations, staff dynamics, leadership) and national (funding, regulation, aging-in-place) challenges presented by assisted living.
Introductory and concluding chapters synthesize new findings that cross the six settings and reflect issues vital to all participants. The book also features an appendix detailing the research process involved in creating the profiles.
Caregiver, Dementia
Loving Someone Who Has Dementia
Care for yourself, while caring for a loved one with dementia
Nearly half of U.S. citizens over the age of 85 are suffering from some kind of dementia and require care. Loving Someone Who Has Dementia is a new kind of caregiving book. It’s not about the usual techniques, but about how to manage on-going stress and grief. The book is for caregivers, family members, friends, neighbors as well as educators and professionals—anyone touched by the epidemic of dementia. Dr. Boss helps caregivers find hope in “ambiguous loss”—having a loved one both here and not here, physically present but psychologically absent.
- Outlines seven guidelines to stay resilient while caring for someone who has dementia
- Discusses the meaning of relationships with individuals who are cognitively impaired and no longer as they used to be
- Offers approaches to understand and cope with the emotional strain of care-giving
Pauline Boss’s book builds on research and clinical experience, yet the material is presented as a conversation. She shows you a way to embrace rather than resist the ambiguity in your relationship with someone who has dementia.
Caregiver, Dementia
The Caregiver’s Guide to Dementia
Care for yourself, while caring for a loved one with dementia
When caring for someone with dementia, your own mental stability can be the single most critical factor in your loved one’s quality of life. The Caregiver’s Guide to Dementia brings practical and comprehensive guidance to understanding the illness, caring for someone, and caring for yourself.
From understanding common behavioral and mood changes to making financial decisions, this book contains bulleted lists of actions you can take to improve your health and your caregiving. Inspirational and compassionate, it focuses on the caregiver’s underlying love and humanity that cannot be taken away by any disease.
In The Caregiver’s Guide to Dementia you’ll find:
- Dementia defined―Understand dementia and its many forms, with an explanation of the illness and its variations.
- Caregiver wellness―At the end of each chapter, a small section provides relaxation and mindfulness exercises and reflection for dementia caregivers.
- Practical approach―The back of the book is filled with resources, from financial planning to tips on safety, along with questions for health care professionals, lawyers, accountants, therapists, and friends.
Caregiver, Elder Care
Navigating Assisted Living – The Transition Into Senior Living
Designed as a practical guide through the complex world of senior living, this book offers support and guidance for families to collaborate, leverage one another’s strengths, and work toward this higher goal of making sure that their loved ones thrive.
Read about how to manage difficult conversations with your loved ones, critical questions to ask during a facility tour, financial breakdown including Medicare and Medicaid, overcoming challenging behaviors, the state-survey process, and much more. With limited resources on the market today, planning for Assisted Living can be overwhelming for those who are making difficult choices for their loved ones.
Get to know the industry standards and understand the difference between Assisted Living, Independent Living, and Skilled Nursing. Author and former Community Relations Director at a prestigious assisted living community, Kristi Stalder, offers solutions to almost any situation; financial, behavioral, and emotional, so you can make an educated decision that will be in your loved one’s best interest. Non-medical and simple, this book provides the facts and resources necessary to create a flawless transition and support through the entire process.
Caregiver, Elder Care
The Aging Boomers
Over 30 experts provide answers to critical questions for you, your parents, and loved ones!
For Baby Boomers, the topics of conversations with friends went from discussing what formula you’re using with your infants to setting up play dates for your toddlers to scheduling car pools for sporting events. Now, the main topic of conversation for Baby Boomers is talking about parents and their illnesses, challenges, cognitive issues, and more.
Senior care authority Frank Samson assists his Baby Boomer client, Linda, to guide her through the challenges she’s facing with her aging parents. He asks the tough questions to experts in health care, law, aging, and senior services. Many of the answers will surprise you. They’ll also help you immediately in dealing with the realities of situations you’ve never had to deal with before.
Here are some of the conversations you’ll be a part of as you read this book:
- Having difficult conversations with aging parents
- Tips on communicating with someone with dementia or Alzheimer’s
- Dealing with family disagreements regarding aging parents
- Benefits of using an elder law attorney
- Reducing stress by using a professional senior placement agency
- Preparing for the costs of long-term care
- Getting assistance in paying for long-term care
- Comparing the benefits of in-home care and assisted living
- What nursing homes don’t often tell you
- Technology that benefits family caregivers
- Protection from elder abuse
- Taking care of you!
Caregiver, Elder Care
How to Say It to Seniors: Closing the Communication Gap with Our Elders
A practical guide to bridging the generation gap.
In How to Say It to Seniors, geriatric psychology expert David Solie offers help in removing the typical communication blocks many experience with the elderly. By sharing his insights into the later stages of life, Solie helps in understanding the unique perspective of seniors, and provides the tools to relate to them.
Caregiver, Elder Care
Another Country: Navigating the Emotional Terrain of our Elders
A New York Times Bestseller
There are more older people in America today than ever before. They are our parents and grandparents, our aunts and uncles and in-laws. They are living longer, but in a culture that has come to worship youth–a culture in which families have dispersed, communities have broken down, and older people are isolated. Meanwhile, adults in two-career families are struggling to divide their time among their kids, their jobs, and their aging parents–searching for the right words to talk about loneliness, forgetfulness, or selling the house.
Another Country is a field guide to this rough terrain for a generation of baby boomers who are finding themselves unprepared to care for those who have always cared for them. Psychologist and bestselling writer Mary Pipher maps out strategies that help bridge the gaps that separate us from our elders. And with her inimitable combination of respect and realism, she offers us new ways of supporting each other–new ways of sharing our time, our energy, and our love.
Caregiver, Elder Care
Coping with Your Difficult Older Parent: A Guide for Stressed-Out Children
Coping with a Difficult Older Do You Have An Aging Parent Who —
- Blames you for everything that goes wrong?
- Cannot tolerate being alone, wants you all the time?
- Is obsessed with health problems, real, or imagined?
- Make unreasonable and/or irrational demands of you?
- Cannot tolerate being alone, wants you all the time?
- Is obsessed with health problems, real, or imagined?
- Make unreasonable and/or irrational demands of you?
- Is hostile, negative and critical?
Coping with these traits in parents is an endless high-stress battle for their children. Though there’s no medical definition for “difficult” parents, you know when you have one. While it’s rare for adults to change their ways late in life, you can stop the vicious merry-go-round of anger, blame, guilt and frustration.
For the first time, here’s a common-sense guide from professionals, with more than two decades in the field, on how to smooth communications with a challenging parent. Filled with practical tips for handling contentious behaviors and sample dialogues for some of the most troubling situations, this book addresses many hard issues, including:
- How to tell your parent he or she cannot live with you.
- How to avoid the cycle of nagging and recriminations
- How to prevent your parent’s negativity from overwhelming you.
- How to deal with an impaired parent who refuses to stop driving.
- How to asses the risk factors in deciding whether a parent is still able to live alone.
Caregiver, Dementia
What if it’s not Alzheimer’s
Although the public most often associates dementia with Alzheimer’s disease, the medical profession now distinguishes various types of “other” dementias. This book is the first comprehensive guide dealing with frontotemporal dementia (FTD), one of the largest groups of non-Alzheimer’s dementias. The contributors are either specialists in their fields or have exceptional hands-on experience with FTD sufferers.
Beginning with a focus on the medical facts, the first part defines and explores FTD as an illness distinct from Alzheimer’s disease. Also considered are clinical and medical care issues and practices, as well as such topics as finding a medical team and rehabilitation interventions. The next section on managing care examines the daily care routine including exercise, socialization, adapting the home environment, and behavioral issues. In the following section on caregiver resources, the contributors identify professional and government assistance programs along with private resources and legal options.
This newly revised edition follows recent worldwide collaboration in research and provides the most current medical information available, a better understanding of the different classifications of FTD, and more clarity regarding the role of genetics. A completely new chapter 5 enlightens the reader about the various drugs that are now being used with FTD patients and also delves into a number of non-medical options. The wealth of information offered in these pages will help both healthcare professionals and caregivers of someone suffering from frontotemporal dementia.
Caregiver
The Caregiver’s Survival Handbook
Being a caregiver can be rewarding but demanding work-and more than 40 million adult children find themselves experiencing the double duty of caring for their elders as they try to carry on a life of their own. The mission of this book is to help caregivers figure out how to look after aging loved ones, provide for other family members, and attend to their own career-without losing themselves in the process.
In this supportive, reassuring, and practical guide, Doctor Alexis addresses the most pressing concerns, including such issues as how to:
*Get all family members to pitch in
*Let go of feelings of guilt
*Avoid conflict with an aging loved one
*Foster independence in the elderly
*Balance the demands on one’s own time and resources
“I have encountered few people who have the knowledge, experience, and passion that Alexis possesses for serving older persons. Alexis has accomplished a lot and has gained a well-deserved national reputation as an authority on issues affecting older persons.”
-Horace B. Deets, former executive director of AARP
Caregiver
The Conscious Caregiver: A Mindful Approach to Caring for Your Loved One Without Losing Yourself
Linda Abbit, founder of Tender Loving Eldercare and a veteran of the caregiving industry, shares her advice on taking care of an older parent or loved one and how to handle everything that goes along with this dramatic life change.
Being a caregiver can be a difficult role. It requires patience, tenderness, selflessness, and hard work. Providing care for someone, whether it’s a parent, a loved one, or as a professional requires a high level of self-love and self-care. But while it may be a rewarding experience to care for a loved one, the emotional and physical stress of caregiving can lead to burnout and exhaustion—causing caregivers to put themselves and their own well-being in the background.
How can you fulfill your role as a caregiver without losing yourself? Conscious Caregiver teaches you how to navigate caring for your loved one, whether it’s full-time in-house caregiving or hiring support from outside services. With information on how to talk to your loved ones about the situation, handle the emotional stress, stay financially secure, and take the time to care for yourself, this guide can help you care for your loved one and yourself at the same time.
Caregiver, Alzheimer’s, Dementia
When Reasoning No Longer Works: A Practical Guide for Caregivers Dealing with Dementia & Alzheimer’s Care
Nearly five million families deal with Alzheimer’s Disease and other forms of dementia on a daily basis. They do this with little training, and often only their good intentions guide them. When Reasoning No Longer Works is the training manual these family caregivers have been searching for.
Written by a Gerontologist with more than twenty years of experience, this reference gives the reader an easy to understand view of what dementia does to the brain, how it is diagnosed, and most importantly, how to deal with its effects.
Bulleted lists clearly explain:
• How to avoid a catastrophic reaction
• Specific approaches for aggressive behavior
• How to deal with disruptive behaviors
• Ways to diminish wandering
• What to do when a wanderer is missing
• When to look for outside help
You’ll also follow the story of Lou and Rose, a couple who share their lives with Alzheimer’s disease. Together, they find the answers to questions caregivers and victims are sometimes afraid to ask.
Caregiver, Aging
A Bittersweet Season: Caring for Our Aging Parents and Ourselves
Just a few of the vitally important lessons in caring for your aging parent—and yourself—from Jane Gross in A Bittersweet Season
As painful as the role reversal between parent and child may be for you, assume it is worse for your mother or father, so take care not to demean or humiliate them.Avoid hospitals and emergency rooms, as well as multiple relocations from home to assisted living facility to nursing home, since all can cause dramatic declines in physical and cognitive well-being among the aged.Do not accept the canard that no decent child sends a parent to a nursing home. Good nursing home care, which supports the entire family, can be vastly superior to the pretty trappings but thin staffing of assisted living or the solitude of being at home, even with round-the-clock help.
Important Facts
Every state has its own laws, eligibility standards, and licensing requirements for financial, legal, residential, and other matters that affect the elderly, including qualification for Medicare. Assume anything you understand in the state where your parents once lived no longer applies if they move.
Many doctors will not accept new Medicare patients, nor are they legally required to do so, especially significant if a parent is moving a long distance to be near family in old age.
An adult child with power of attorney can use a parent’s money for legitimate expenses and thus hasten the spend-down to Medicaid eligibility. In other words, you are doing your parent no favor—assuming he or she is likely to exhaust personal financial resources—by paying rent, stocking the refrigerator, buying clothes, or taking him or her to the hairdresser or barber.
Caregiver, Alzheimer’s
Learning to Speak Alzheimer’s: A Groundbreaking Approach for Everyone Dealing with the Disease
More than four million Americans suffer from Alzheimer’s, and as many as twenty million have close relatives or friends with the disease. Revolutionizing the way we perceive and live with Alzheimer’s, Joanne Koenig Coste offers a practical approach to the emotional well-being of both patients and caregivers that emphasizes relating to patients in their own reality. Her accessible and comprehensive method, which she calls habilitation, works to enhance communication between carepartners and patients and has proven successful with thousands of people living with dementia. Learning to Speak Alzheimer’s also offers hundreds of practical tips, including how to:
· cope with the diagnosis and adjust to the disease’s progression
· help the patient talk about the illness
· face the issue of driving
· make meals and bath times as pleasant as possible
· adjust room design for the patient’s comfort
· deal with wandering, paranoia, and aggression
Caregiver, Dementia
Coffee with Mom
Sometimes, life takes you places you don’t want to go.
Dementia and Alzheimer’s is a journey no one wants to take, yet life doesn’t give us a choice. Author Mike Glenn’s mom didn’t want to be sick, and while she couldn’t overcome the devastation of disease, she wasn’t going down without a fight.
She fought the illness, denying its presence. She fought the doctors, “Who were these idiots anyway?” And she fought him, “How come you think you’re in charge now?”
Coffee with Mom is a book about a mom’s fight with dementia and the struggle of a son who wanted to help but didn’t always know how. Most of their conversations—and sometimes battles—happened during morning coffee.
This book isn’t about knowing all of the answers. It is one son’s journey with his mom—a mom with Alzheimer’s and a son who did the best he could, and who wrote this story in hopes that you’ll find a few laughs for your journey, realize you’re not alone, and find the courage to do the best you can.
So, pour yourself a cup of coffee, and join us on the journey. You’ll find yourself in the laughter and tears of not knowing what to do next and making a decision that you hope works out, knowing it’s the best you can do in the moment.
In the end, that’s all that matters. “Do the best you can” is all love requires.
Caregiver
What To Do When I’m Gone
mother’s advice to her daughter–a guide to daily living, both practical and sublime–with full-color illustrations throughout.
One sleepless night while she was in her early twenties, illustrator/writer Hallie Bateman had a painful realization: her mom would die, and after she died she would be gone. The prospect was devastating, and also scary–how would she navigate the world without the person who gave her life? She thought about all the motherly advice she would miss–advice that could help her through the challenges to come, including the ordeal of losing a parent.
The next day, Hallie asked her mother, writer Suzy Hopkins, to record step-by-step instructions for her to follow in the event of her mom’s death. The list began: “Pour yourself a stiff glass of whiskey and make some fajitas” and continued from there, walking Hallie through the days, months, and years of life after loss, with motherly guidance and support, addressing issues great and small–from choosing a life partner to baking a quiche. The project became a way for mother and daughter to connect with humor, openness, and gratitude. It led to this book.
Combining Suzy’s wit and heartfelt advice with Hallie’s quirky and colorful style, What to Do When I’m Gone is the illustrated instruction manual for getting through life without one’s mom. It’s also a poignant look at loss, love, and taking things one moment at a time. By turns whimsical, funny, touching, and above all pragmatic, it will leave readers laughing and teary-eyed. And it will spur conversations that enrich family members’ understanding of one another.
Caregiver
The 36-Hour Day
Through five editions, The 36-Hour Day has been an essential resource for families who love and care for people with Alzheimer disease. Whether a person has Alzheimer disease or another form of dementia, he or she will face a host of problems. The 36-Hour Day will help family members and caregivers address these challenges and simultaneously cope with their own emotions and needs.
Featuring useful takeaway messages and informed by recent research into the causes of and the search for therapies to prevent or cure dementia, this edition includes new information on
- devices to make life simpler and safer for people who have dementia
- strategies for delaying behavioral and neuropsychiatric symptoms• changes in Medicare and other health care insurance laws
- palliative care, hospice care, durable power of attorney, and guardianship
- dementia due to traumatic brain injury
- choosing a residential care facility
- support groups for caregivers, friends, and family members
The central idea underlying the book—that much can be done to improve the lives of people with dementia and of those caring for them—remains the same. The 36-Hour Day is the definitive dementia care guide
Caregiver, Dementia
The Dementia Handbook
Providing dementia care is profoundly stressful for families and caregivers. People with dementia or Alzheimer’s experience emotional distress, which leads to behavioral complications and the need for institutional care. However, if families and caregivers are able to identify the emotional needs caused by dementia and understand which skills are lost and which remain, they can lower the behavioral complications and their own stress.
As the founder of the Dementia & Alzheimer’s Wellbeing Network® (DAWN), Judy Cornish approaches dementia care with clear and empathetic methods that not only improve the lives of the individuals with dementia but also of those caring for them.
Dementia and Alzheimer’s are very personal and individual experiences—they vary from person to person. However, Cornish has identified a pattern in the abilities and disabilities of people living with dementia. Based on her findings, Cornish was able to develop methods for caregivers to ease emotional distress, which can quickly and safely resolve behavioral complications.
Though people with dementia lose a sense of self, they are still the same person you always loved. Judy Cornish understands this. The Dementia Handbook: How to Provide Dementia Care at Homeis the supportive guide you’ve been looking for as you walk alongside your loved one on this difficult—but potentially rewarding—new path.
Caregiver, Dementia
Loving Someone Who Has Dementia
Research-based advice for people who care for someone with dementia
Nearly half of U.S. citizens over the age of 85 are suffering from some kind of dementia and require care. Loving Someone Who Has Dementia is a new kind of caregiving book. It’s not about the usual techniques, but about how to manage on-going stress and grief. The book is for caregivers, family members, friends, neighbors as well as educators and professionals—anyone touched by the epidemic of dementia. Dr. Boss helps caregivers find hope in “ambiguous loss”—having a loved one both here and not here, physically present but psychologically absent.
- Outlines seven guidelines to stay resilient while caring for someone who has dementia
- Discusses the meaning of relationships with individuals who are cognitively impaired and no longer as they used to be
- Offers approaches to understand and cope with the emotional strain of care-giving
Boss’s book builds on research and clinical experience, yet the material is presented as a conversation. She shows you a way to embrace rather than resist the ambiguity in your relationship with someone who has dementia.
Caregiver, Dementia
Dementia Reimagined
The cultural and medical history of dementia and Alzheimer’s disease by a leading psychiatrist and bioethicist who urges us to turn our focus from cure to care.
Despite being a physician and a bioethicist, Tia Powell wasn’t prepared to address the challenges she faced when her grandmother, and then her mother, were diagnosed with dementia–not to mention confronting the hard truth that her own odds aren’t great. In the U.S., 10,000 baby boomers turn 65 every day; by the time a person reaches 85, their chances of having dementia approach 50 percent. And the truth is, there is no cure, and none coming soon, despite the perpetual promises by pharmaceutical companies that they are just one more expensive study away from a pill. Dr. Powell’s goal is to move the conversation away from an exclusive focus on cure to a genuine appreciation of care–what we can do for those who have dementia, and how to keep life meaningful and even joyful.
Reimagining Dementia is a moving combination of medicine and memoir, peeling back the untold history of dementia, from the story of Solomon Fuller, a black doctor whose research at the turn of the twentieth century anticipated important aspects of what we know about dementia today, to what has been gained and lost with the recent bonanza of funding for Alzheimer’s at the expense of other forms of the disease. In demystifying dementia, Dr. Powell helps us understand it with clearer eyes, from the point of view of both physician and caregiver. Ultimately, she wants us all to know that dementia is not only about loss–it’s also about the preservation of dignity and hope.
Caregiver, Dementia
Dementia with Grace
Are you dealing with “problem” behaviors as you struggle to care for your loved one with Alzheimer’s or another form of dementia? You are not alone. Are you wondering why “problem” is in quotation marks? Well, read on!I believe that although much is lost at each stage of dementia, there is much that remains. I believe that when you see the “why” of a behavior, it ceases to be “problem” and rather becomes an opportunity for deeper connection. Did you know that almost all behaviors are because of an unmet need? I believe that by understanding this basic tenet and then using that knowledge to reframe the disease and its effects, we can better meet the needs of those we love.The techniques you will find in this guide will help you navigate the rough days and steer you toward more graceful days. This approach to behavior management has been developed over years working with people with dementia. In these pages, you will find an approach for just about any behavior that emerges! You will come to understand HOW to manage the behavior by learning WHY certain behaviors occur and WHAT you can do to keep “problem” behaviors at a minimum. Using a proven, systematic approach to behavior management based on the acronym, G.R.A.C.E., you will you discover the meaning behind each step, and discover how extending and receiving grace can help both your loved one receiving care, AND you, as a caregiver.
Caregiver, Alzheimer’s
The Caregiver’s Toolbox
This is your guide to cool apps and online tools, insider tips on how to reduce your medical bills, your privacy rights as a caregiver, where to go for free and low cost help, and much more. It clearly shows which tools will relieve your stress, and those that may add stress.
Caregiver, Alzheimer’s
Creating Moments of Joy
The beloved best seller has been revised and expanded for the fifth edition. Jolene Brackey has a vision: that we will soon look beyond the challenges of Alzheimer’s disease to focus more of our energies on creating moments of joy. When people have short-term memory loss, their lives are made up of moments. We are not able to create perfectly wonderful days for people with dementia or Alzheimer’s, but we can create perfectly wonderful moments, moments that put a smile on their faces and a twinkle in their eyes. Five minutes later, they will not remember what we did or said, but the feeling that we left them with will linger. The new edition of Creating Moments of Joy is filled with more practical advice sprinkled with hope, encouragement, new stories, and generous helpings of humor. In this volume, Brackey reveals that our greatest teacher is having cared for and loved someone with Alzheimer’s and that often what we have most to learn about is ourselves.
Caregiver
Grace for the Unexpected Journey
For the weary dementia or Alzheimer’s caregiver
If you are a caregiver to someone with Alzheimer’s or another type of dementia, you carry a heavy load. On top of having to watch someone you love suffer, you are probably losing sleep, growing frustrated, and struggling with loneliness or even depression. With little to no help and no time for a break, this unrelenting stress is hard to carry.
Whether that’s you or someone you know, the caregiver needs care, too. Grace for the Unexpected Journey: A 60-Day Devotional for Alzheimer’s and Other Dementia Caregivers provides that support.
Each daily devotion:
- Is short, ideal for demanding schedules
- Reflects on a relevant Scripture passage
- Features a relatable caregiving story
- Offers a key Scripture for meditation
Debbie Barr is a speaker, health educator, and the author of multiple books, including Keeping Love Alive As Memory Fades (coauthored with New York Times bestselling author Gary Chapman). As a health educator with a deep concern and compassion for dementia caregivers, she saw their need for faith-based encouragement. With compassion and understanding she uses Scriptures to address their practical hardships and spiritual concerns.
When the struggles seem insurmountable, this devotional offers strength. When stress floods in, it points to peace. And when darkness falls, it illuminates hope. Caregivers walk a long, difficult road. This devotional gives grace for their journey.
Caregiver, Alzheimer’s
Surviving Alzheimer’s
The book recommended by dementia experts and family caregivers as the most complete, practical guide to Alzheimer’s and other dementias—now updated and expanded through end-of-life care.
This new edition of Surviving Alzheimer’s offers the best, most current thinking on how to help a loved one with memory loss and related symptoms without sacrificing YOU. You’ll learn:
- What’s behind odd, frustrating behaviors like repetition, wandering, personality changes, bathing resistance, and aggression—and what you can do
- How to defuse resentment, guilt, and family friction
- What to say for better communication and more cooperation
- Special advice for spouses, out-of-town caregivers, and other specific situations
- 100s of confidence-raising solutions from top doctors, social workers, dementia specialists, and family caregivers
All in a fast, scannable format perfect for busy or overwhelmed dementia helpers.
Caregiver, Alzheimer’s
Activities to Do with Your Parent Who Has Alzheimer’s Dementia
This book provides a selection of user-friendly activities that will help maintain your parent’s self-care skills, mobility, and socialization. These tasks encourage success and feelings of self worth, and offer imaginative ways to interact with your parent. The Activity Assessment Form objectively allows you to look at each of these tasks. It can help to determine the setup and environment that works best with your parent. This written format is a tool which also encourages consistency between caregivers. In this book you will find:
- Over fifty activity ideas with implementation suggestions
- Activity Assessment Forms
- Alzheimer’s dementia support sources
- Caregiver burnout prevention ideas
- Definitions of frequently used medical terms
- Room by room safety suggestions
- Home and personal safety assessment
Caregiver, Alzheimer’s
Where is Whitney Now?
This is an intimate, heartfelt, no-holds-barred recounting of the Cramers’ seemingly charmed lives, and the frightening erosion of the life they had planned. When Whitney suddenly slipped beyond Don’s ability to manage her care, it required an immediate, gut-wrenching move to the enchanting colonial hill town of San Miguel de Allende in central Mexico, where he had located a remarkable Alzheimer’s facility to provide the loving care for Whitney he had thought impossible.
What happens in San Miguel is compelling, heartbreaking and inspiring. Where is Whitney Now? interweaves the story of the Cramers’ first ten years with Alzheimer’s along with Don’s journal entries of Whitney’s continuing decline since arriving in Mexico. The story reveals his jumble of emotions, his caretaking strategies, his profound sense of loss, and the search for his own new place in the world.
It is a fascinating read: sobering, and ultimately transformative. As we watch Whitney slip away, we have a front row seat on the unstoppable rollercoaster of the escalating demands required to handle a future they could not have imagined.
Caregiver, Alzheimer’s
Living with Alzheimer’s and Other Dementias
Caring for a loved one with Alzheimer’s or another form of dementia? You are not alone. With 101 encouraging and inspiring stories by others like you, this book is a source of support and encouragement throughout your caregiving journey.
Alzheimer’s disease and other forms of dementia affect millions of people, and this book is especially for caregivers. This collection, a joint project with the Alzheimer’s Association, is filled with 101 stories of love and lessons from others like you, will support and encourage you as you care for your loved one.
Caregiver
While They’re Still Here
After a lifetime of strained bonds with her aging parents, Patricia Williams finds herself in the unexpected position of being their caregiver and neighbor. As they all begin to navigate this murky battleground, the long-buried issues that have divided their family for decades—alcoholism, infidelity, opposing politics—rear up and demand to be addressed head-on.
Williams answers the call of duty with trepidation at first, confronting the lines between service and servant, guardian and warden, while her parents alternately resist her help and wear her out. But by facing each new struggle with determination, grace, and courage, they ultimately emerge into a dynamic of greater transparency, mutual support, and teachable moments for all. Honest and humorous, graceful and grumbling, While They’re Still Here is a poignant story about a family that waves the white flag and begins to heal old wounds as they guide each other through the most vulnerable chapter of their lives.
Caregiver
My Two Elaines
Former governor of Wisconsin Marty Schreiber has seen his beloved wife, Elaine, gradually transform from the woman who had gracefully entertained in the Executive Residence to one who sometimes no longer recognizes him as her husband. In My Two Elaines: Learning, Coping, and Surviving as an Alzheimer’s Caregiver, Marty candidly counsels those taking on this caregiving role. More than an account of Marty’s struggles in caring for his wife, My Two Elaines also offers sage advice that respects the one with Alzheimer’s while maintaining the caregiver’s health. As two-thirds of those with Alzheimer’s are women, he offers special guidance for men thrust into an unexpected job. With patience, adaptability, and even a sense of humor, Marty shows how love continues for his Second Elaine.
Caregiver, End of LIfe
Lessons from the Dying
Rediscover the mystery and wonder of life through gentle reflections on death and dying.
What can death teach the living? Former monk and hospice worker Rodney Smith teaches us that through intimately considering our own inevitable end we can reawaken to the sublime miracle of life we so often take for granted. A well of stories, personal anecdotes, and direct advice gleaned from years of working with the dying in their final moments, Lessons from the Dying helps us redefine our conception of what it means to truly live. Each chapter contains guided reflections and exercises that allow the reader to integrate the wisdom in its pages more fully into their lives. With a sense of compassion, Lessons from the Dying provides all the tools of mind one needs to rediscover, in this very moment, the mystery and wonder of a lifetime.
From the foreword by Joseph Goldstein: “Lessons from the Dying could also be called “lessons for the living” because of the courageous honesty revealed in so many of the stories told here. These accounts reflect back to us our own attitudes toward death and love, and they prompt us to examine the way we are living our lives right now. In the busyness of our lives we rarely take time to consider our mortality and the implications that it might have for the choices we make. Yet when we do cultivate this awareness it becomes a powerful force for wise discrimination.”
Caregiver, End of Life
Living With Dying – A Complete Guide for Caregivers
This easy-to-use guide for caregiving instructs you how to:
- Have the conversation
- Navigate the emotional and spiritual journey
- Control pain
- Address symptoms
- Work with hospice
- Care for yourself
- Get your loved one’s affairs in order
“When losing a loved one, we are a loss: How do we talk about it? How do we make business and financial plans? How do we face the final hours? This book is the one book we need: respectful, experiential, richly researched, joyful.” Barbara Brownell Grogan, former editor-in-chief, National Geographic