Holiday Gifts for aging/old/older mothers continues but first–

Sr. advisor, R, was able to join–with wheelchair– the family Thanksgiving celebration–a gift for her and for the 12 of us. In our efforts to help parents age well, we were careful not to exhaust her–although not completely successful.  While a lot of stimulation is fun, it uses energy that is in shorter supply in older people making it difficult for them to gear down.  But it made for good sleeping for R that night, once back at the rehab center.

Giving mobility-challenged older people the gift of an outing, if one does this alone, may merit practice with loading and unloading a wheel chair or walker; and may present initial stress.  The staff at care centers is helpful, we found, offering a mini lesson.  In our case, the actual transporting to and from our car was no problem–went more smoothly than the mini lesson.

R says this first outing gave her confidence to go out again.  My husband thinks a drive; I think a drive + lunch.  We’ll see.  Of one thing we’re certain, she won’t go out holiday shopping. That said, she did ask for one of her catalogs and a looked-forward-to appeal letter so she could order Christmas gifts for those special people who live near and are dear to her; and to make certain a local food bank gets its annual Christmas donation.