THE DEVIL’S IN THE DETAILS: COMMUNICATING IN CAREGIVING
Here’s a scenario that every caregiver will recognise: Your elderly parent has fallen and you’ve left work to be with her at the ER. Tests will be performed including x-rays…
Tyze Personal Networks
How Local Communities Can Help Caregivers
If you imagine a caregiver at the beginning of a care journey, he or she might be represented as a dot on the map of a neighbourhood. She would be…
How Local Communities Can Help Caregivers
If you imagine a caregiver at the beginning of a care journey, he or she might be represented as a dot on the map of a neighbourhood. She would be…
AN UPDATE ON ME
I thought it was time for an update on what's been going on with me. Since Christmas, it's been busy! Here's what I've been up to:My husband Jim and I…
A Unique Canadian Story of Care, Innovation and Refugees
Melissa Campbell, founder of The Refugee Response Group, is a young Edmonton mother with a compassionate heart. When she heard about the plight of Syrian refugees, she wanted to help…
HOME: The Making of a Sanctuary
Guest Post by Vickie Cammack (Originally published in Safe and Secure: Six Steps to Creating a Good Life for People with Disabilities by Al Etmanski)For one glorious summer in the…
An Early Caregiver Month Treat: A Chat With Amy Goyer, Caregiving Author and AARP Blogger
November is caregiving month and to kick off just a tiny bit early, here’s a special treat. This week I had the pleasure of interviewing Amy Goyer about her new…
Technology & Teamwork Can Ease Transition for Kids With Disabilities
For most, high school graduation is a happy and hopeful celebration as parents launch their children into a successful, independent life. But there’s an expression that parents of children with…
A Tragic Death, A Cautionary Tale and Lessons About Protecting Our Loved Ones
Guy Mitchell. Guy Mitchell. Guy Mitchell. I can’t get that name out of my head. And when I think of Guy, I am afraid for my son, my mother and…
Want to Be Included in Your Loved One’s Home Care Team? Here’s How
I spend a lot of time reading about how families manage caring for loved ones all over the world. Today, developed nations share common challenges – aging populations, more people…
WHAT IS A SUPPORT NETWORK AND WHAT WILL IT DO FOR ME?
I wrote this for an audience of adults with disabilities who want to get started using a tech tool to coordinate the help of friends and family in a circle…
Preparing to Care From Afar During Spring Break Holiday
There may be parents of children with disabilities who travel as a family during spring break, but I’ll leave that subject for another post. Today, I would like to talk…
Five Tips for New Caregivers
By Jacob Edward As Americans, we tend to forget that care giving has existed for almost as long as humans have been around. Recently, with the recession in 2008, more…
LIFE GETS EASIER WITH CONNECTION TO A CIRCLE OF CARE
This week, I was honoured to contribute an article to The Home Care Technology Report, a publication of Rowan Consulting Associates. Tim Rowan is a consultant and information broker on…
My Best Caregiving Tip
After twenty-five years of intensive caregiving, the most important thing I’ve learned is that giving good care over time requires a team. Trying to manage alone and without the help…
Sharing the Care Online – Can It Really Help?
When my son Nicholas was born with severe disabilities in 1988, my husband and I struggled to care for him on our own. Nick turns 25 at the end of…
The Wisdom of Caregivers: Part II – Our Power and Love
Recently, I wrote about the wisdom and knowledge of caregivers. Families giving care sometimes feel that they are operating in a vacuum – that the only compassionate place is the…
Not Social Networking, CARE NETWORKING
In my life of caregiving, I have learned two absolute truths. 1) That my love, my will and my intellect cannot cure the effects of ageing or disability in the…
Power Politics: Professional Caregivers in the Family Home
Recently, I gave an interview with Nicole Scheidl, of Fit Minds, a program for enhanced communication between people with dementia and their caregivers. My topic for this interview was the…
Envisioning a Better Future for Caregivers
Arthur Kleinman understands families like mine. I know he does, because he wrote this: The chronically ill often are like those trapped at a frontier, wandering confused in a poorly…