The Unexpected Caregiver: How Boomers Can Keep Mom & Dad
Active, Safe and Independent
By Kari Berit
As their parents grow older, millions of Baby Boomers are being thrust into a caregiver role, often with little warning or preparation. In a sense, they must function like activity directors in senior-care facilities, helping their parents come to terms with day-to-day concerns and longer-term issues.
Kari Berit has provided age-assertive ideas and information for professional caregivers through her Active Seniors column for a national journal. In The Unexpected Caregiver (2007: Attainment Company, Madison, WI), she retargets her upbeat, practical ideas to the needs of Boomers who must take on a caregiver's role, but without a professional's experience, training or access to institutional resources.
The result (in the words of one reviewer) is "an unexpectedly activist view of caregiving for people who too often are consigned to inactivity." The Unexpected Caregiver examines a wide range of issues and concerns, starting with the often tenuous - even strained - state of communications between Baby Boomers and their aging parents.
Separate multi-chapter sections of the book then provide ideas and insight on: maintaining mental, emotional and physical health; assisting with parent-directed activities; finding creative outlets, from travel and music to writing a children's book; and dealing with delicate end-of-life issues.
An author and consultant based in Red Wing, MN, Kari Berit brings extensive professional and personal knowledge and experience to her subject. She co-developed Attainment's innovative Mental Fitness Program and speaks frequently on aging issues. She also has been a primary caregiver for her mother and her grandfather.
Already, an estimated 15 million Baby Boomers are caring for their parents. By some projections, as many as half someday will. For anyone who takes on the highly emotional role of caregiver to an aging parent, The Unexpected Caregiver offers priceless support, ideas and comfort.
The Unexpected Caregiver (paperback, 192 pp., ISBN 1-57861-606-9) retails for $19 and is available from both Kari Berit Presents (www.kariberit.com) and Attainment (www.AttainmentCompany.com).
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