{"id":288,"date":"2019-04-27T16:55:51","date_gmt":"2019-04-27T23:55:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/portolagardens.ciminocare.com\/?p=288"},"modified":"2019-04-27T16:55:51","modified_gmt":"2019-04-27T23:55:51","slug":"what-to-do-when-seniors-refuse-help","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ciminocare.com\/portola-gardens\/what-to-do-when-seniors-refuse-help\/","title":{"rendered":"What To Do When Seniors Refuse Help"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong><em>How should caregivers respond when older adults won&#8217;t accept advice or assistance?<\/em><\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p>Ask any caregiver about the most challenging aspects of assisting older adults, and you\u2019ll likely hear examples of their frustration when help is offered&nbsp;but&nbsp;refused.<br \/><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>There\u2019s no doubt that many senior adults need varying levels of assistance with daily activities, says a recent study from the National Center for Health Statistics. Approximately one in five seniors, age 75 and older, need help with day-to-day tasks such as shopping, doing household chores, handling finances, and managing medications, according to&nbsp;the&nbsp;study.<br \/><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In a study published in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pmc\/articles\/PMC4903030\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\"><em>The Journals of Gerontology<\/em><\/a> found that more than three-fourths of grown children&nbsp;think their parents are stubborn&nbsp;about taking advice or accepting help with&nbsp;everyday&nbsp;activities.<br \/><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>For caregivers and senior adults, these conflicts\u2014which may escalate over time\u2014can result in a standoff in which the older adult will turn away from any advice, suggestions, or offers of help&nbsp;from&nbsp;caregivers.<br \/><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>What strategies can caregivers use to encourage seniors to accept assistance, especially when it\u2019s obviously needed? Our trained staff at CiminoCare would like to share some advice with&nbsp;you.&nbsp;<br \/><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Understand motivations<\/strong>. Try to discover why your older adult is resisting. Does he or she resent the changed power dynamic (you\u2019re the \u201cparent\u201d and he is the \u201cchild)? Is she denying the realities of growing older and losing independence? Is there depression or confusion? Try to ascertain what the older adult is afraid of. Listen to his or her concerns&nbsp;without&nbsp;judgment.<br \/><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Choose your battles<\/strong>. How important<strong> <\/strong>is the matter?<strong> <\/strong>Is it a critical health or safety issue? Or it is something that\u2019s irritating you\u2014but not, in the overall&nbsp;scheme,&nbsp;consequential?<br \/><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Accept the situation<\/strong>. If seniors are not endangering themselves or others, step aside and let them make their own choices. They will then experience the consequences of their behavior\u2014and may be more inclined to allow your assistance in the future. They may even ask&nbsp;for&nbsp;help!<br \/><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Ask them to help <\/strong><strong><em>you<\/em><\/strong>. Explain to seniors how much it would mean to you if they would allow you to be useful to them. Aging adults proclaim that they don&#8217;t want to be a burden, which is understandable\u2014but let them know that you want to feel needed. Assure them that they&#8217;re letting you give back to them, and that it would be a gift to&nbsp;you.&nbsp;<br \/><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We invite you to attend our Caregiver Support Group at our Portola Gardens community in San Francisco. We have several upcoming meetings on Tuesday, April 30 at 1pm, and Monday, May 28&nbsp;at&nbsp;1pm.<br \/><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Email Imelda at <a href=\"mailto:Imelda.celestino@ciminocare.com\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer&nbsp;noopener\">Imelda.celestino@ciminocare.com<\/a>&nbsp;<br \/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>How should caregivers respond when older adults won&#8217;t accept advice or assistance? Ask any caregiver about the most challenging aspects of assisting older adults, and you\u2019ll likely hear examples of their frustration when help is offered&nbsp;but&nbsp;refused. There\u2019s no doubt that many senior adults need varying levels of assistance with daily activities, says a recent study [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":295,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-288","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ciminocare.com\/portola-gardens\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/288","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ciminocare.com\/portola-gardens\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ciminocare.com\/portola-gardens\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ciminocare.com\/portola-gardens\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ciminocare.com\/portola-gardens\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=288"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.ciminocare.com\/portola-gardens\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/288\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ciminocare.com\/portola-gardens\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/295"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ciminocare.com\/portola-gardens\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=288"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ciminocare.com\/portola-gardens\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=288"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ciminocare.com\/portola-gardens\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=288"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}