It’s not unusual for parents to move in with their adult children as they get older. The ability to spend more time as a family is just one benefit of this type of living arrangement. But if your parents require medical attention, a situation like this could put a strain on you as the caregiver.
Thankfully, there are several actions you can take to make this kind of living situation as stress-free as possible.
Benefits of Living With Your Elderly Parents
Living with your elderly parents has a lot of advantages. Three of the top benefits include:
- Reducing expenses
- Convenience of care
- Mutual assistance
Reducing Expenses
Living with your elderly parents may reduce costs, which is a potential advantage.
Combining households can be more cost-effective than maintaining two separate homes, in addition to avoiding the potential cost of residential elder care facilities.
Convenience of Care
The convenience of not having to travel back and forth to help out is another significant advantage of caring for elderly parents in your own home. Mom might be two rooms over if you wanted to check on her rather than making the 15-minute drive to her house.
If you and your parents don’t live close by, this benefit is especially important.
Mutual Assistance
Additionally, elderly parents can occasionally assist their adult children. Senior parents may help with simple household tasks or watch your children while you and your partner are out.
The opportunity for elderly parents, adult children, and grandchildren to develop closer bonds during their later years of life is perhaps the best benefit of living together.
Challenges of Caring for Elderly Parents
Living with elderly parents can be challenging, but that shouldn’t come as a surprise. You’ll have some obstacles to overcome if you want to have a good time.
Some of these challenges may include dealing with:
- The loss of privacy at home
- An impact on the adult child’s marriage
- Aspects of caregiving you may not be comfortable with
- Feelings of obligation / guilt / resentment
- The child/parent relationship in the adult child’s home
Some other issues that may arise are:
- What if it takes more time than anticipated?
- How can we adjust to our needs changing?
- How should I manage my aging parents who have dementia?
When caring for parents at home, all of these scenarios and difficulties are typical occurrences. But it is possible to prepare for and get past these challenges in a way that benefits everyone.
How to Live With Elderly Parents Peacefully?
Dealing Emotionally
Set ground rules for how you and your parents will coexist. Your family will need to adopt a new dynamic that takes into account your new living situation without treating your parents like house guests. Establish ground rules for regular household activities that will need to change in light of the new arrangements, such as eating dinner together, going out to spend time, or watching TV.
Be willing to prioritize yourself occasionally. If you don’t care for yourself, you can’t be a good caregiver. Keep an eye on your own mental and emotional well-being, and if providing care is having a negative impact on you, ask for help from someone else.
If your parent has dementia, do not anticipate thanks or admiration. Your efforts may go unappreciated if one or both of your parents suffer from dementia and are unaware of everything you are doing to take care of them. Recognize that this isn’t a reflection on you as a person, but rather a symptom of their condition to stop yourself from becoming discouraged.
To avoid burnout, give yourself the breaks you require. In the end, caring for elderly parents is a marathon, not a sprint. Keep an eye on your own emotions and take a break from caregiving when it becomes too much to prevent burning out from your duties.
Establishing a Care Web
Recognize your limitations and the areas where you require assistance from others. Children who care for elderly parents frequently experience severe strain. Regardless of how you view yourself, you probably won’t be able to adequately care for your parents because of your own limitations. If this occurs, acknowledge that there are some tasks you simply cannot complete on your own and take action to enlist the aid you require.
Identify people you can turn to for support in times of need. You’ll need to be able to call on someone who can temporarily take over your caregiving responsibilities when you’re on the verge of burning out so that you can take a break. Find out from friends and family who would be willing to assist you when you need some alone time.
Engage a qualified nursing assistant who is able to manage medical situations. You should seek out a medical specialist who can help if your elderly parent is ill and exhibiting symptoms or limitations that you are ill-equipped to handle. Medically trained home health care aides are employable as freelancers or through home health agencies.
To arrange your parents’ affairs, seek legal assistance. There may be unresolved financial matters or crucial papers (like wills) with your elderly parents., wills) that will need to be put in order once you begin caring for them. To receive the best expert assistance in addressing the legal issues related to caregiving, consult a lawyer who focuses on elder law.
Satisfying Your Parents’ Needs
Stock up on and prepare foods that satisfy their dietary requirements. As they get older, your parents might have a chronic illness that requires them to eat certain foods or avoid others, or they might become physically incapable of preparing and eating for themselves. Make sure you can take care of your parents in these situations by preparing wholesome meals for them and, if necessary, feeding them.
If your parents struggle with mobility, make your home more user-friendly. To make it simpler for your parents to move around your house, you might need to spend money on home upgrades or accessories like reachers or a stair lift.
Whenever necessary, help your parents with their daily tasks. Beyond attending to their medical requirements, your main focus as a caregiver for your elderly parents will be assisting them in carrying out the ADLs, or Activities of Daily Living. Self-feeding, bathing, mobility, and maintaining personal hygiene are a few of these.
Look for any government aid that you or your parents might qualify for. The government offers a variety of benefits and ways to get money to help those who need care as well as caregivers. Investigate whether you or your parents are eligible for these benefits by visiting government websites.
When you require assistance, ask a professional. You might reach a point in caring for your parents where you realize you simply can’t give them everything they need. To get the assistance you require at that point, get in touch with a qualified caregiver or a home health care aide.
Conclusion
Living with elderly parents can enable you to save money on expenses like paying extra rent for their apartment. People who choose to provide long-term care for their elderly parents rather than having them moved into an assisted-living facility or nursing home are typically driven to do so by a burning desire to take excellent care of them.
FAQs
Why is My Elderly Mother So Demanding?
It’s possible that your parent’s demanding and difficult behavior is stemming from depression or frustration with their loss of independence. If they lose certain physical abilities and have their driver’s license revoked, many elderly people have a tendency to become more sedentary and asocial.
Why is My Elderly Mother So Negative?
They may experience a lot of negative emotions if they are bored or lack a strong sense of purpose. These feelings are frequently made worse by deteriorating mobility, diminished energy, and other age-related changes that affect independence, daily routines, and functioning.
