You May Not Remember, But I Will Never Forget

Givers-of-careSay the title of this article out loud to yourself.   Let that sink in for a moment.  Can you picture yourself silently saying this to your aging parent who struggles to remember the past?  Now picture yourself saying it with a smile in your heart.  You are building new memories that you will have for a lifetime.  Make them count using the power of photos.

This is something I tried to remind myself of often when spending time with my dad during the final stages of his Alzheimer’s and I find myself doing the same as I enjoy time today with my mom.   That cruel disease of Dementia, stealing the memories of our loved ones, can be discouraging.  But if you try to remember that you are building new memories, while leaning on the old memories, you will one day look back and be glad you thought of it this way.  I know I am.

Using the Power of Photos to Build New Memories

One possible way to create new fun memories with your loved one who suffers from memory loss is to use photos to stimulate conversations about the past.   Photographs from the past allow patients to reminisce about pleasant times in their lives. Photographs from the present help patients relate to their current situation. The patient experiencing memory loss is able to “remember or recognize someone they love and know in a world where so many things are now unfamiliar to them.”2 A study by Ellen Mahoney of Boston College found that, in one instance, photos distracted the Alzheimer’s patient from the effects of Alzheimer’s disease.

 

Using the “Moments” platform of the Genus™ App, you and all the other members of your caring community can use a consistent set of photos to work with your aging loved one.  From the app, you can upload the photos you take to a digital photo frame for your loved one to enjoy.  My mother comments almost daily on how much she loves the photos we send to her via our phones to her photo frame.  It makes her feel part of her children’s and grandchildren’s lives to see the photos they send from their various adventures.   Of course she adores the photos we take when we’re with her as well, but she really benefits from seeing “surprise” photos pop up on her frame from her loved ones’ comings and goings.

 

10 Photo Tips for Families Facing Alzheimer’s

Compiled by the Alzheimer’s Association® in partnership with Shutterfly, here are 10 ways you can help lift a person with dementia to reminisce:

  1. Place photos in chronological order.Photo books can be great tools for showing someone’s life history or story. Start your photo book at the beginning of the person’s life and lead up to the present day. Organize the book around key moments and concentrate on happy occasions to assist with engagement. Also, keep the design simple, with one or two pictures per page, so the photos are easy to focus on.
  2. Show relationships. To help spark recognition of family members, dedicate a section to each person. Choose photos that include the person with the family member from different life stages and place them in chronological order.
  3. Select meaningful moments. Be sure to include photos that reflect the person’s meaningful life moments and depict his/her favorite hobbies or activities, such as weddings, graduations and vacations.
  4. Make it an activity.Work with the individual as appropriate to create the book, and share memories and conversation as you put it together.
  5. Engage in conversation.Ask open-ended questions about the people or events in the photo. How were you feeling in that picture? Tell me about your brother. What are some of your favorite childhood stories? Tell me more about this picture. The answers are less important than the conversation and engagement.
  6. Share your own memories.As part of the conversation, share your memories and feelings when looking at the pictures. Answer some of the same questions you’re asking the person with Alzheimer’s.
  7. Connect, don’t correct.This is more about making a connection and sharing memories. Focus on connecting with the person, not correcting them.
  8. Revisit frequently. Take the time to frequently revisit memories using the photos. Do what works best for the individual. It may be daily or weekly, depending on the person.
  9. Mix it up.Don’t discuss the same set of photos week after week. To help keep it fresh and interesting, discuss various parts of the book with different people and events on a regular basis.
  10. Move at a comfortable pace.Follow cues from the individual to gage their interest level and determine how they are reacting to the photos.

 

 

It’s important to monitor your loved one’s reactions to the activity.   If the reaction is joyful or reminiscent, you are on the right track.  There may be times that the photos may somehow agitate him/her, then obviously you will want to redirect.  Like anything we do when dealing with dementia, what works one day, may not necessarily work the next.  One of our many challenges that keeps us on our toes!

Help for Alzheimer’s Givers of Care

It’s late at night, you feel like you need some support, you don’t feel like calling the 24/7 Alzheimer’s hotline, but you need some sort of boost in the arm as you try to figure out the best way to care for your loved one with memory issues.  this Facebook page to find help with lots of real time tips for people caring for someone with Dementia.

What’s nice about this is that you can post a question or challenge, and receive answers from those who are in the trenches, just like you: Everyday people, using technology to get through this challenge, together.

At genusConnect, we want to provide you with the best up to date resources to help you in this time of need. If you find other helpful websites such as the one above, please contact us and let us know so we can share it with others. We can care better, together.

Helpful Checklists for Givers of Care

Home Safety

The most important checklists you will need right away when caring for an aging loved one are listed below.  To print these checklists for use at home, you can access this article from your home computer by going the website.  https://www.giversofcare.org

This website is where all the articles from the Genus App are housed, so if reading from a computer is easier, you can have access from this site.

  • This checklist will help you with the many things to think about when looking for a long term facility for providing care for a loved one.
  • This checklist will help you choose an agency for In-Home-Care.
  • A medication checklist that you may want to use if you are not documenting meds in the Genus™ App.
  • This checklist will help you gather all the important financial and legal documents and information you need to have on hand when caring for a loved one.
  • A home-safety checklist is always a good idea to make sure your loved one is safe.
  • The VA provides some more useful checklists when caring for a Veteran on this site.
Disclaimer:  These links are being provided as a convenience and for informational purposes only; they do not constitute an endorsement or an approval by the genusConnect™ of any of the products, services or opinions of the corporation or organization or individual. genusConnect™ bears no responsibility for the accuracy, legality or content of the external site or for that of subsequent links. Contact the external site for answers to questions regarding its content.

Medical Safety for Receivers of Care

One of the most frustrating things to deal with when caring for an aging parent is the many health complications that arise as one ages.   Medical safety is of key concern.  Many family member also acting as caregivers have not had a great deal of experience dealing with doctors and various medical safety issues.   There are many questions that arise, making the whole caring experience a bit overwhelming without the proper information.

Using the Genus™ App

You can document your loved one’s medical conditions in the medical section of the app, list the doctor contact info for that condition along with pertinent medications.  To have all this information literally at your fingertips on your phone is invaluable.   All it takes is one person dedicated to entering the information, and once it is there, any approved member of your care community can easily access this important info as needed.   The end result is caring better, together.

Most important to medical safety is the value of tracking specific medical information inside the app.  Maybe you want to track the patient’s blood pressure and heart rate each day, along with their mood and mobility factor.  All of this is easy to do with the touch of a few keys using the Genus App.

Help in an Emergency

I can honestly say that if I had this app available to me when my dad was alive as we were caring for him with his Alzheimer’s condition, it would have been very helpful.   More than once I was called by the nursing home to say that my dad was being sent to the ER due to a fall or something similar.  Always in the middle of the night.  Then I would go to the ER, sleepy and bleary-eyed, being asked all kinds of questions by the doctors of which I had no answers for.   You see, I wasn’t the family member in charge of the medical information. That was my sister Jane.  She was the medical guru of the family and did a wonderful job keeping track of our parents’ medical conditions and appointments.  But that one person can’t always be available during an emergency.  Had I had the medical information on my phone, as we can do with the Genus App, it would have provided better emergency care for my dad and much less frustration for us both.  I am grateful to have this App to use with my mom, especially the emergency feature: the little red cross.   I have all the pertinent information at my fingertips!  What a relief!!

Another helpful website

For dealing with medical safety, go to https://healthfinder.gov/     Here you can type in the age of your patient and see what recommended health screenings are suggested as well as find out information on a variety of health issues that may be affecting our loved ones.   There is plethora of information here to help you navigate through these complex health issues.