Talk to Your Aging Parent Without Starting the Battle of Words

Communication Skills for Adults and Their Aging Parents

How to Talk to Your Aging Parents Without Starting the Battle of Words

Often working adults tend to develop a language of their own. It is usually connected with words or phrases they use in their career, work life, or profession. I learned years ago, when I would talk with my senior adult clients and even my own parents, the words I used in communications I wanted to convey, was filled with “medical-es”. It became obvious I was not communicating in a way the individual could easily understand.

I learned to constantly re-think my words in an effort to clearly express a more simplified statement with less words and less points that I needed to make. In addition I would find ways, to check in with the person to determine their comprehension without making them feel incompetent in any way.

This approach served me well with senior clients and aging parents. Recently, I was needed to take my 90 year old father-in-law, to a doctor appointment and then on to the hospital ED. After all day of multiple medical professionals constant questions and answers and tests, he was ultimately admitted for inpatient care. We both were exhausted. During a quiet moment, he said to me: “You do a really good job of explaining things to me, where I can understand and know what all is going on.”

This of course was a blessing to me but I need others with aging parents to know, it had nothing to do with my medical experience. I had not worked in a clinical setting in over twenty years and nothing is the same. The key was, my first and foremost goal was for my father-in-law, to clearly describe his problems to the professionals. Next I wanted him to clearly understand what each staff person was communicating to him and understand each next step that was being recommended.

I see this same type of misfire or miscommunication when aging parents and adult sons and daughters are talking about different long term care issues. Regardless of what the aging parent says to their adult child, the adult child usually hears: “you are a child; I am the parent”. And when the adult child thinks they are “helping” the aging parent, the aging parent hears: “I will fix this and then I can get on with my life”.

This reminds me many years ago, of a class my husband and I attended on marriage communications, called Love and Respect. The instructor used pink and blue to describe what happens when husbands and wives communicate without thought. She speaks in pink and he hears her words with blue hearing aids; representing the way males and females think differently. This is a simplistic point that was part of a deeper subject helpful to married couples of any age, but marriage is not the topic of this post.

Useful communication between aging parents and adult children does not come naturally. It is built on love and respect, and a personal relationship, or lack thereof. It is based on having the same definitions for terms used in a discussion. It is a process.

“Process:

a systematic series of actions directed to some end; a continuous action, operation, or series of changes taking place in a definite manner.”

In order for the communication to be effective in producing action and results, one must make some changes in the usual way of thinking and communicating. The adult child has to come to a place of understanding that these conversations about future care needs, in reality, has nothing to do with their own wants, needs, and desires for their parents. Rather, the conversations, plans, and discussions has everything to do with uncovering how their parent feels about their last life stage. It’s about uncovering a parent’s vision of what they want to happen as they age, how will they get the care they may need, what will that look like in the short and long term.

One way to help draw this vision out is to allow the parent to identify all the options for care, all the alternatives for living arrangements, and numerous other options that are available to assist in resolving problems that the parent may identify. There are about five main conversations that adult children need to have with their aging parents while it is still possible. Don’t wait too long to start!

A virtual program, Plan Together for the Best Aging Journey, I created, some years ago, for adults with aging parents, included the main conversations needed to co-create an aging plan. A part of my book, will include this content and much more.

My intention for some of my future posts here, will give you more ideas from my work with sons/daughters who have aging parents, as the book continues to be written.

Stay Tuned!