If your parents have Alzheimer’s, you need The Secret of Adult Day Care Episode 69

by Rocking Retirement Gal | Apr 10, 2017 | Helping your Parents or Spouse, Podcast | 0 comments

Lisa Tyburski discusses Adult Day Care Programs

Caregiving is relentless. It is exhausting beyond belief and caregivers need a break. Adult Day Programs (AKA Adult Day Care) are a way for people to get a break. They can drop their loved one off in a safe environment.

I spoke with Lisa Tyburski from The Glenner Centers which offers Adult Day Programs AKA Adult Daycare Center from their 3 locations in San Diego. Lisa shared with me the powerful story about how The Glenner started. It was founded in 1982 by Dr. Glenner and his wife Joy. Dr. Glenner was a researcher at the UCSD school of medicine. He was working to advance research in the Alzheimer’s field. One night around midnight, he and his wife Joy received a phone call from the husband of one of Dr. Glenner’s Alzheimers patients. The husband, who had been a caregiver to his wife was frantic. He was absolutely at the end of his rope and he had a loaded gun in his hand. He was going to murder his wife and commit suicide. Dr. Glenner knew he needed to come up with a solution to help the caregivers.

You can go to work, run errands, take a nap, or whatever you need to do to tend to the other areas of your life. You know that your loved one is being taken care of.

The Glenner Centers provides brain-stimulating activities. This can also help with sundowner's syndrome in the evenings. Some of these activities include:

Singing and music
Listening to and discussing current events
Animals brought in from the Humane Society
Socializing

I had NO idea these places existed and I had to learn more.

Have a care giver? No problem, you can still use Adult Day Programs (AKA Adult Day Care).

Things Lisa says you should look for when looking into an Adult Day Programs (AKA Adult Day Care):

Do they specialize in dementia if your loved one has dementia?
What is the staff to participant ratio?
How many total participants in the center on any given day. You may want to look for a smaller center for more personalized experience
Do they have a nurse on staff and ask if they can manage medications?

If you would like to contact Lisa or The Glenner Centers you can email information@glenner.org or ltyburski@glenner.org and the website is www.glenner.org

The freebie for this episode is ABC's of Dementia which you can get by going to http://RockYourRetirement.com/abc

Special Thanks to:

Angie Strehlow who helps us get great guests that help us with our retirement lifestyle while keeping everything on track…and helps with these show notes!
Les Briney, my husband, and Danny Ozment of Emerald City Pro who edits the show and makes my guests and me sound terrific
Lesinda Tubalado who helps keep the website up to date
Henry Shapiro, host of Retired Excited that airs on Fridays
YOU for telling your friends about the show, leaving comments below, and sharing episodes you really like on Facebook.

This post on Retirement Lifestyle first appeared on http://RockYourRetirement.com

ABCs of Alzheimer’s: Interview with Dave Jackson

by Rocking Retirement Gal | Oct 17, 2016 | Helping your Parents or Spouse, Podcast | 0 comments

Dave Jackson talks about his experience with Alzheimer's

On the 10/17/16 episode of the Rock Your Retirement show, Kathe interviewed celebrity Dave Jackson about his experience with Alzheimer's disease.

Dave Jackson runs the School of Podcasting. Frances McGrogan, a previous guest, and I talked about how he helped us learn how to podcast in episode 21.

This chat wasn't about podcasting though. It was about his experience with Alzheimer's Disease, which is a form of Dementia. Dementia is a heartbreaking disease, and Dave tells his story about how he was able to deal with it.

Dave told us about his father, and his experience with Alzheimer's. The family thought that the symptoms were due to a mugging that he had experienced earlier in his life. As his father got older, Dave and his brother realized that something was wrong. Dad was always bringing up certain stories and repeating them. (But we all do that, right?)

Dad went to the hospital for colon cancer. The hospital diagnosed him with dementia, and Dad couldn't be left alone.

The family had to do some quick planning. They only had a week to find a place for him to stay.

A common side effect of Alzheimer's is inappropriate sexual behavior. It's also common for Alzheimer's patients to form a new love relationship while they are in memory care. This can be a problem if the spouse is still alive. Dave's Dad got “frisky” in the memory care unit.

Every time he visited, Dad gave Dave a tour. it was brand new to Dad. His Dad also introduced him to the nurses each time. He also told him who was in the photos on the wall each time Dave visited. This is also common in Alzheimer's patients.

The staff coached the family on how to deal with Dad. “Don't correct him”, was one their advice.

It's difficult for the family. People are bound to have mixed emotions. Dementia patients need a lot of sleep. It is exhausting for them to try to do things, and their brains work differently than ours do. So you go to visit, and Dad is asleep. That's hard to deal with if you've come a long way to see him or her. You don't want to wake them up. Then when he wakes up, you get the tour again!

A great piece of advice from Dave: There may be a day when your Dad might not recognize you. Don't take things personally because it's not you, it's the disease.

To get the our free guide, ABC's of Dementia, just click HERE. You can also listen to the episode on your favorite smartphone podcast app, or click on the player at the top of this page.