Helping Your Aging Parent: A Step-By-Step Guide

It may begin with a call in the middle of the night. Or it may seep in after years of your own denial. Sooner or later most of us are going to called to help an aging parent. And your help can make a great difference in the quality of their life. It can also provide you a rare opportunity to get to know and help the person who once took care of you.

Unfortunately, most of us don't know where to start, or even if our help is really needed, as sometimes appreciation is not shown.

This book shows you step-by-step how to start pro-active care for your aging parent, from preparing for the initial doctor visit, to protecting their assets. It covers different housing options available, and how to select the right home for your parent. Also gives tips for surviving a hospital stay, selecting a decent nursing home, dealing with the mind-boggling aspects of dementia, and finally, what you should look for in a good hospice.

Emphasis is on practical problem solving and prevention, yet the reader is encouraged to develop a spiritual connection to help them through their journey.

Includes checklists, forms, and worksheets to keep you firmly on track. All are included on a FREE CD-ROM inside the back cover. Open the forms you need with your word processing program, for either IBM-style or Macintosh computers. Change them to suit your needs, fill them out, and then print. Or open in Adobe Acrobat Reader and print out or e-mail to relatives.

William J. Grote has worked in the publishing industry for 25 years, and was thrust into the parent-care world when his once-independent, 80-year-old mother started exhibiting signs of dementia. William and his sister stumbled and fumbled through the healthcare, housing, legal, nursing home, and hospice systems. In their efforts to solve what they perceived to be the problem, they learned the ropes the hard way. This manual has the lessons they learned, the research they did, the discoveries they made.