Companion Home Care: As they get older seniors can feel like they are not valued by society and even by their loved ones.
When seniors feel like they don’t have a place or like they aren’t valued that can trigger symptoms of depression or make them feel down in the dumps. Everyone needs to feel like they are valued and have a purpose. You or your companion home care aide can help your senior parent feel valued by spending time with them doing these activities:
Scrapbooking Family Photos
Your senior parent is a wealth of knowledge about different people in the family, and they may be the only one or one of the only ones left that knows the family history. A fantastic activity to do with your senior loved one is to scrapbook boxes of old family photos together. As you go through each old photo ask your parent who the people are in the photo and what their stories are. Write down on the photo the names and dates of the people in them so that the next generation will have a visual representation of the family history.
Creating a Family Tree
Displaying photos and mementos is a good way to keep seniors engaged and help them remember different family members. You can create an artistic display of family photos to accomplish this by creating a family tree of photos on the wall. Hang photos of different generations together to create an enormous wall-sized family tree that your senior loved one can enjoy all the time without having to lift heavy scrapbooks. Ask your senior loved one about the people in the photos. If you have trouble hanging the photos or creating a tree for the wall an elder care provider can help you.
Recording Family Stories
This is a fantastic way to spend an afternoon with your senior loved one. Bring a tape recorder or use your computer or smartphone to record a video of your senior loved one telling stories about their parents, siblings, and other family members. You will be preserving valuable family history in your loved one’s own words. If you don’t get to spend as much time with your senior loved one as you like you can have an elder care provider record your senior parent telling all of the old family stories. Your senior loved one will be thrilled to be asked to tell all the stories they remember and stories from when they were young.
Companion Care at Home: Making A Family Quilt
Another wonderful project you can do to make your senior parent feel valued is to create a family quilt that can be passed on to other generations. Gather up some clothes from all the other members of the family and then cut them into patches and designs that you can use in a quilt. You can do the actual sewing, or you can have a companion home care aide help. Your senior loved one can help you cut patches and keep you entertained telling you family stories while you quilt together.