While an assisted living community is beneficial for your loved ones, they might be wary and unwilling to do so because it is such a big change in their life. Fortunately, explaining more about assisted living and its numerous benefits and joys can relieve their worries and bring excitement instead. Therefore, here are 5 tips to explain what is assisted living to your loved ones.
Be Positive
This may appear to be a strange bit of advice, but it is one that is sorely needed right now. After all, the last thing you want to do is go to your loved ones with bottled-up emotions, anticipating the worst and feeling prepared to fight. Going into the conservation with such negative emotions will be sure to make your loved ones feel even wary and unwilling to converse with you. Therefore, try to adopt a more positive and optimistic attitude, follow your loved one’s lead and let the discussion flow naturally.
Start Talking About It Soon
For the best results, you should start talking about the plans for an assisted living community soon. If you do not do so, you will end up with insufficient time to properly talk and explain what is assisted living to your loved ones. As a result, it can end up with them feeling like it is a mere instant decision to send them away and their opinions do not matter. Instead, you can naturally bring up the conservation in a casual way and place, such as over meals.
Be Understanding
While it is important to talk to your loved ones as soon as you can, it is equally, if not, even more, important that you are understanding and empathetic during the conservation. The move to an assisted living community is all about them after all. Therefore, try to be more open-minded, and listen to their concerns, questions, and opinions. In addition, you can also start the conservation by saying that you understand this is a difficult topic to talk about, but there are numerous benefits of an assisted living community, like meeting new friends and not needing to do chores. However, you still value their opinions the most and would love for their views.
Promise to Engage Them in Decision-Making
Everyone wants to have a say in where they live and how they are cared for. This predilection does not alter with age. If your loved ones are well enough, invite them to accompany you on tours of assisted living communities or visits to friends and relatives who have already made the transition. When it comes to making a selection, seeing these settings in person, gaining a sense of how they operate, and chatting with current residents frankly about their experiences would be quite beneficial and can help convince your loved ones better.
Be Informed
Educating yourself more about assisted living before you talk to your loved ones is also important. Not only will it give a better idea of what will work best for your loved ones, but it will allow you to answer any of their concerns or what-ifs. At the same time, by understanding assisted living better, you can better tell your loved ones the benefits of moving there.
