Family caregiver of senior loved ones is a role that knows no bounds of gender, age or ability — requiring only that one care enough to take actions that make better the lives of aging family members.
It isn’t even necessary to be in the senior’s home, city or state to provide valuable senior care. That’s fortunate, because families are so dispersed today. As millions of Americans demonstrate daily, providing care to a senior loved one is possible across distances near and far.
“Out of sight, out of mind” is not applicable to those who are — or want to be — long distance family caregivers. The opposite is often true, with the worry, stress and guilt felt by many being a factor that impact their own lives and ability to care for their children, other loved ones and themselves.
Providing Care from a Distance
We’re using the feature segment of this episode of the Senior Care Corner Show to tell distant family members they CAN be effective caregivers and discuss a few of the many, many ways they can take meaningful action from afar that makes better the lives of senior loved ones. Here are some of those we discuss.
- “Being there” for senior loved ones from a distance, including video calling, text messaging, social media and more ways made possible by digital technology.
- Using video and voice calls to monitor the health and well-being of senior loved ones, including those things for which we can look and listen and how to take action when there are indications of health or safety issues or other problems, such as elder abuse.
- Assisting senior loved ones in obtaining and understanding their healthcare and advocating for their care needs as well assisting with their finance management.
- Contributing in areas that match the senior’s needs with the family caregiver’s skills, knowledge or interest.
- Supporting family caregivers local to the senior loved one by using vacation or holiday time to give them breaks from their caregiving roles and other assistance.
Long Distance Caregivers Need Care Too
It’s important for long distance family caregivers to remember that they ARE caregivers and may have many of the same physical, mental and financial impacts as their local counterparts when it comes to the senior care they provide.
Caregivers need to put a priority on their own needs in addition to those of the ones under their care so they keep themselves able to give their best to loved ones.
Podcast:
You Might Be a Family Caregiver, the Video