Help! Aging Parents: exhaustion

Showing posts with label exhaustion. Show all posts

Friday, August 1, 2014

Cleaning Out My Elderly Parents' Soon-to-be-sold Home

Going Through 80+ Years of Meaningful Moments

Sorting Then VP Richard Nixon--campaigning
and a vintage photo of boys playing marbles?

It's tedious. Making decisions--what goes (and to whom); what stays; what we think we can sell, and what gets shredded on the (I think) first-generation shredder in my parents' home. Tackling the many boxes' contents can feel like a newbie's climb up Mt. Everest. I've hated and loved every minute.

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Tuesday, June 24, 2014

AGING PARENTS: SELLING PARENTS' HOME

There’s going to be a moving/estate sale this weekend. 70+ years of things to go through and clean out. People running the sale come tomorrow. It feels like the locusts are going to descend and I need to take anything of value–sentimental or otherwise–to a safe place......

.........My brother had the good sense to leave town a few days ago, leaving me to go through everything by myself. Exhausting but also a way to have an intimate kind of closure. A cousin offered to help, but I liked sifting through things and stopping to read this or smile at that–without interruptions...

To view entire post, please visit my other site.

Hi, I'm Susan~

--Wife, teacher, counselor, author, and a far-away-living adult child for decades.

I came from the West to NY for the graduate program in counseling at Teachers College, Columbia U, and have stayed and worked in NY throughout my adult life.

Although far from family, I always knew I would "be there" if my parents needed me. Mother died just short of her 88th birthday; Dad died at 94, and most recently my-i-l, Sr. Advisor R--who lived alone (no caregivers) in her own home--died in June 2015 at 101.

Helping others comes naturally.

As a teenager I was a “Dear Abby” to my friends; later–as a teacher–an untrained counselor to my students. Graduate work and my counseling degree led to a career I’ve loved: counseling high school students and their families. This included–as divorce rates rose in the ’80’s–writing Helping Children of Divorce: a Handbook for Parents and Teachers, published by Schocken Books.

Help! Aging Parents is an extension of my ongoing desire to use my professional training and experience to help others.

About This Blog

Helping parents age well sounds so basic, but it doesn't happen automatically. While we train for the important parts of our lives (childbirth, driving, SATs, jobs), helping parents age well throughout the life cycle is usually on-the-job training--after a health event necessitates fast-forward learning.

Help! Aging Parents is committed to sharing the best information, professional advice, personal experiences and creative ideas to help parents and grandparents age as independently and well as possible until the very end.

* * *

As my parents aged I became aware of a sharp contrast: the ever-present enormous physical and emotional energy of my teenage counselees struggling to develop confidence, assert independence, increase relationships and have fun, while my parents' generation was trying desperately to hold onto these aspects of living.

This led to a disturbing realization: we conscientiously encourage and support younger people who have a full life ahead but--often unwittingly-- diminish and devalue older people. The implications: Younger people feel good about their ability to move forward, while older people can feel "what's the use, I'm old" leading to problems for them and for their children.

This is where we can--and do-- make a difference.

Friday, August 1, 2014

Cleaning Out My Elderly Parents' Soon-to-be-sold Home

Tuesday, June 24, 2014

AGING PARENTS: SELLING PARENTS' HOME

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