Alzheimer’s and dementia can deeply affect kids and teens
Children may become afraid, confused, sad, angry, frustrated, guilty, worried or embarrassed when a family member has Alzheimer’s. The Alzheimer’s Association has resources to help kids and teens understand what’s happening — and to help them cope.
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Learn more about kids and Alzheimer’s >>
http://www.alz.org/living_with_alzheimers_just_for_kids_and_teens.asp?WT.mc_id=enews2012_06_27
Researcher in clinical trial of drug she helped develop
Dr. Rae Lyn Burke is one of the key developers of bapineuzumab, a potential Alzheimer’s drug in the clinical trials stage. She is now participating in the clinical trial of the drug — hopefully to reduce the progression of the disease in her own brain.
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New service helps map out a plan to navigate Alzheimer’s
When facing Alzheimer’s disease, there are a lot of things to consider. The Alzheimer’s Navigator™ — a free online tool designed specifically for individuals with Alzheimer’s and their caregivers — helps guide you to answers by creating customized action plans and providing access to information, support and local resources.
Learn more about Alzheimer’s Navigator >>
https://www.alzheimersnavigator.org/?WT.mc_id=enews2012_06_27
At retirement, one relationship that often changes is with your spouse or partner. In the early and middle years of a marriage, couples normally don’t spend a lot of time together. As partners, they are busy making a living, raising a family and fixing up a home. In a recent survey, it was found the average married couple spends only three or four hours a week together without the children, and that may be collapsing on the couch and watching TV.
Due to today’s hectic pace, each partner tends to develop his/her own schedule and routine around their work, family and home demands. Then retirement comes and it’s a time to relax and enjoy, which includes spending quality time with a partner. It’s supposed to be the time when we enrich our relationship; when we do things and go places together.
However, a relationship filled with good times is not something that just happens. Like all other aspects of retirement, it requires planning and effort. As part of your client’s plan, it’s important to recognize that partners have built up their own space and privacy needs. Each needs time to pursue his/her own interests, hobbies, tasks or just ‘chill out alone’.
One train of thought is if a client were apart from their partner eight hours a day during the working days, your client and his/her partner should plan to be apart approximately four hours a day in retirement. This enables each partner to have his/her own time and space. Encourage your client to talk with his/her partner about their individual needs and agree on how those needs can be successfully fulfilled.
Frank and Amber agreed that when Frank retired he would participate in activities outside the home three mornings a week. They also agreed while Amber had the house to herself, she would indulge in her hobby – pottery. The couple agreed that twice a week, they would walk to their favourite pastry shop for coffee and once a week have a ‘date night’. This arrangement has worked out well and Frank and Amber have recommended their ‘time and space’ plan to other retired couples.
As part of relationship planning, it’s important to identify to each other what retirement means in terms of roles and responsibilities. By doing this, your client creates a mini job description; it can outline dates, duties, responsibilities and authorities.
Before Dick and Anastasia began their retired life, they discussed who would be responsible for what in retirement. It was mutually decided that Dick would do the grocery shopping, snow shovelling and raking. He would make the bed each morning, prepare for dinner and several other domestic chores. As part of the division of duties, Anastasia would do the cleaning and vacuuming, washing and drying of clothes, folding and ironing. They agreed that household decorating would be done together. This sharing of responsibilities assisted Dick and Anastasia build a harmonious working relationship without one partner feeling he or she is doing the lion’s share of the work.
Though it is easy to take each other for granted, the preparation for retirement provides your client and his/her spouse an opportunity to assess and enhance their relationship. Being thoughtful, expressing appreciation, having a sense of fun and adventure, these are traits among others that add to the quality of a relationship and the satisfaction level between partners.
As part of your client’s spousal retirement planning, encourage him or her to do little things that add spice to the relationship – such things as buying flowers, sports equipment or treating their partner to lunch. Saying ‘thank you’ goes a long way to recognize what a partner does. Spending quality time together and sharing fun activities adds to any relationship.
Relationships are like a garden. They require regular care and feeding if they are to grow and become fruitful.
http://blog.csa.us/2012/05/spousal-partner-relationships-in.html
Meet Our CSA Spotlight – Alan Wyngarden
With a passion for serving the senior community, Alan Wyngarden’s ideas turned into reality, with the opening of two memory-care assisted living homes and co-founding Universal Senior Living, a senior-based web resource for seniors and their families. Read his story.
http://www.csa.us/email/spirit/ssarticles/0612CSASpotlight.html
I think what drew me to want to serve the senior community was when I started thinking about how the end of my father’s life played out and the fact that my mom was aging through the process as well. When I began to think of the specific needs and requests of my father as his time drew nearer to the end, and the needs of my mom both during and after his passing, I decided to start exploring the senior market to see where I might be able to fit in and help.
About 24 months ago I took a deep look into the market and laid out plans to open a small boutique memory care assisted living home called Applewood Our House, which is located in Golden, Colorado. I had no idea at the time that it would become so meaningful and that it would impact everyone, staff and family alike, at such a heart felt level. I am in the process now of opening a second one in Lakewood.
At the end of 2011 with plans already in the work for Applewood we also began the journey into developing a web based resource for seniors and their families so that they could have a “one stop shop” to go to as a resource to help them navigate through the challenges associated with aging – which is www.UniversalSeniorLiving.com.
We wanted seniors to be able to go through the changes of aging while being able to maintain their dignity, and to give families a resource to help put them at ease when they entered a time when all of the “knowns” about their loved ones had suddenly become “unknowns”. We also wanted to provide a way to give other small businesses who serve seniors a way to get infront of them, so there is an aspect to the site that also helps these small business owners.
Getting our CSA designations and the knowledge gained through their course has been extremely valuable. I know that our relationship with the CSA organization itself as well as with individual CSA’s across the country will be invaluable as I continue to try and find ways to serve this very special population of people.