![\"family\"](\"https:\/\/www.firstlighthomecare.com\/home-healthcare-salem\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/88\/2015\/01\/family-300x218.jpg\")
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A famous author once wrote, \u201cYou can tell a lot about a person by the way he handles these three things: A rainy day, lost luggage, and tangled Christmas tree lights.\u201d I\u2019d add ailing parent to that list.<\/p>\n
There are few situations as stressful as caring for a loved one, especially if you never thought you\u2019d be the one caring for them. Maybe you thought your dad would take care of your mom but he passed away unexpectedly. Or your sister always said she\u2019d do it, but she\u2019s now busy with three young children. Or, if you\u2019re like most of us, you lived life assuming everything would work out if your parent ever needed care.<\/p>\n
With every heartbreaking story I hear about someone caring for an ill parent, I usually hear an equally heartbreaking story about family strife. Sometimes it\u2019s a sibling, sometimes it\u2019s a spouse, sometimes it\u2019s both. Simple-seeming questions\u2014Should we move mom out of her home? Is dad ready to come home from rehab? Should we hire an outside caregiver?\u2014become fodder for arguments and reasons for future resentment.<\/p>\n
I\u2019ve written in the past about my failings in this area. As my father-in-law\u2019s health deteriorated, so did my patience. Although I usually tried to be supportive of my husband and his siblings as they navigated the seas of aging, there were days that compassion and kindness eroded into selfishness and impatience. Those were the days that instead of feeling compassion for his sickness, I felt frustrated with the hopelessness of the situation. I can\u2019t say I was the best wife on those days.<\/p>\n
If you\u2019re reading this and struggling with the family dynamics of caring for an ailing loved one, chances are, you think you\u2019re the one who\u2019s in the right. You may be the person putting in all the time, providing round the clock care for your loved one, or footing the bill to provide it. You may feel like others have let you down, and you very well may be right\u2014but there\u2019s almost always another perspective.<\/p>\n
Maybe your brother can\u2019t see past the loss of his parent to help make decisions right now. Maybe your dad is suffering from his own health issues that make him an incapable caregiver. Maybe your wife is exhausted from spending every day with a toddler and a newborn and the thought of taking on one more living thing\u2014even a houseplant\u2014overwhelms her (as was my excuse).<\/p>\n
Families often become disjointed during illness because decisions are made and actions are taken without the family ever sitting down to say, \u201cLet\u2019s figure this out together.\u201d If you\u2019re in a place where you feel your family can\u2019t agree on how to take care of your loved one, it\u2019s critical that you talk about it. Rather than say, \u201cWhy can\u2019t you \u2026\u201d and \u201cI think we should\u2026\u201d say the words, \u201cI care what you think; tell me about it.\u201d<\/p>\n
I can\u2019t promise you that knowing all the reasons behind someone\u2019s behavior will make the problems go away, but it may help relieve some of your daily stress. It might even help you agree on some solutions. Perhaps most importantly, it could help you preserve a relationship with a family member that will undoubtedly matter more to you in 20 years than what\u2019s happening right now.<\/p>\n
Originally published in The Swampscott Reporter<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n Molly Rowe owns FirstLight Home Care with her husband, Steve, and lives in Swampscott with their two sons. FirstLight provides non-medical in-home care to adults in Swampscott, Marblehead, Lynn, Salem, Peabody, Danvers, Beverly, and Lynnfield. For more information and help caring for your loved ones in the comfort of their own homes, please visit FirstLight\u2019s website at <\/em>www.salem.firstlighthomecare.com<\/em><\/a> or contact Molly at <\/em>781-691-5755\/mrowe@firstlighthomecare.com<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" A famous author once wrote, \u201cYou can tell a lot about a person by the way he handles these three things: A rainy day, lost luggage, and tangled Christmas tree lights.\u201d I\u2019d add ailing parent to that list. There are few situations as stressful as caring for a loved one,…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":31,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[3,4,5,6],"class_list":["post-30","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-aging-parent","tag-family","tag-home-care","tag-senior-care"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.firstlighthomecare.com\/home-healthcare-salem\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.firstlighthomecare.com\/home-healthcare-salem\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.firstlighthomecare.com\/home-healthcare-salem\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.firstlighthomecare.com\/home-healthcare-salem\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.firstlighthomecare.com\/home-healthcare-salem\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.firstlighthomecare.com\/home-healthcare-salem\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.firstlighthomecare.com\/home-healthcare-salem\/wp-json\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.firstlighthomecare.com\/home-healthcare-salem\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.firstlighthomecare.com\/home-healthcare-salem\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.firstlighthomecare.com\/home-healthcare-salem\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}