Word: oftens
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Eldercare and end-of-life debates often hit families after decades of negotiating nothing more serious than where to spend Thanksgiving. We can be grownups with successful careers and kids of our own, yet all the old stuff ambushes us: sibling rivalry, entrenched roles and resentments, the way our family talked or didn't talk about important things...
...Friction often stems from parents giving their children different information about how they're doing. Mom may put on a good show for the out-of-towner, who then discounts what the local sibling says. Annie Groeber, 43, a freelance media producer, used to pop up from Washington to see her mother, who would make light of her many health problems. So until Groeber moved to Baltimore to help out more, she had trouble believing what her sister said about their mother's deteriorating condition or the personality changes caused by her medications. "Tracey would say, 'You have no idea...
...Hiatts have managed this period better than most. After years of talks with their five far-flung kids, in 2002 the parents moved from Boise, Idaho, to an assisted-living facility in Eugene, Ore., 10 minutes from Jeanne Walker, the daughter who has had the best relationship with their (often difficult) mother. At 59, Walker works part time as a nurse. Her older brother helps out twice a week, and their three siblings, who live in other states, spend their vacations on parent duty. When their mom complains unrelentingly, Walker calls her siblings to vent. "It makes a difference...
Research shows that emotional support for caregivers is critical to their well-being and to family harmony. Too often, anger on one side leads to guilt and defensiveness on the other, resulting in sibling gridlock. Sometimes a therapist or clergyperson needs to referee family meetings. For status updates, Patricia Mulvey, a geriatric-care manager in New York, favors simultaneous e-mails. "That way," she says, "Susie won't hear it before Joey, and that can reduce tension...
Every group sending out so many emails lowers the probability that each email will be read and runs the risk of alienating potential event attendees. Additionally, this type of publicizing often depends on students planning their schedules weeks or days in advance. Many students take things day-by-day and will go to events whenever they have time; because list-serves aren’t personalized to ad hoc schedules, emails can be completely ineffective when students delete them days before the event happens. Often, students only find out about interesting events the morning after they happen...