Change one Correction into one Emotional Response Before correcting, explaining, or reminding someone of something they said incorrectly, respond to the emotion. For example: Instead of: You already ate. Consider: You're still feeling hungry, let's find something small to nibble on.. So the challenge for today, is to select one correction/explaining to one emotional response.

Instead of focusing only on what the person says, listen for: - fear - loneliness - insecurity - loss - embarrassment - confusion - need for reassurance - need for control What feeling might be underneath the words you keep hearing?

Which part of the task is breaking down? Instead of "Why won't they do this?" Consider "Where does the task begin to fall apart?" Join in...the challenge today is to watch where your loved one hesitates, stops, repeats, becomes frustrated, or asks for help. Where does the task seem to break down?

Premier episode: what's going on in the brain that makes dementia caregiving different.

This is a story about what happens when something quietly carries pressure for years without anyone thinking to check on it, because it has always worked perfectly. Last week a pipe under my house burst but I didn't immediately discover it. Hundreds, possibly thousands of gallons of water spewed from that little copper pipe until we heard the hissing of water and recognized it as something to handle immediately. The pipe didn’t fail because it was defective or weak. It was more than fifty years old. It had spent decades doing exactly what was asked of it, day after day, while remaining largely unseen. No one inspected it because the water kept flowing. Its reliability became the very reason no one considered what it might need. And when it finally gave way, I did what many caregivers do: I crawled underneath, stopped the immediate damage, and held things together until someone with the right expertise could help. I didn’t repair a fifty-year-old copper pipe through determination alone. I called a professional. That is caregiving. We tend to notice the systems supporting our lives only when they stop working. As long as the water flows, we rarely think about the pipes carrying it, or the pressure they have held for years. Caregivers can become like that: dependable, largely unseen, and taken for granted precisely because they continue to manage what needs to be managed. But reliability does not eliminate wear. Strength does not make someone maintenance-free. And asking for help is not an admission that the caregiver has failed. Sometimes it is simply the recognition that no one should be expected to carry unrelenting pressure indefinitely without inspection, support, or repair.