As an adult, one of your parents may have passed away. This means the other parent is still living in the family home. They most likely have become more fragile, both physically and mentally.
How do you begin that talk?
- If there are several adult children, schedule a weekend you can all get together at the family home.
- Do not make it a holiday weekend. Save that for fun family events.
- One of the siblings needs to take the lead and create an agenda on what is to be discussed.
- Call the parent that is living in the home and tell them all the adult children are concerned for their well-being and want to have a family discussion. The adult parent may disagree, but do it anyhow.
- In the agenda, leave it open so that they can ask questions to the parent. What do they need help with?
- Do they need help with grocery shopping, doing laundry, running errands, remembering their medication, experiencing sleepless nights or loneliness, and more?
- Let them share their feelings. Then it’s up to the adult children to find resources and discuss solutions to help them.
- Should they move to a retirement community, one of the siblings homes or in an apartment nearby?
- Do we need to get caregivers to assist?
- Do we arrange for weekly or bi-weekly house cleaning, or a professional to stop by and check on them?
- In some cases, adult children have strong opinions and may disagree. But it is all about the parent on what they want. BUT, the adult children can use resources such as Complete Relocation Solutions to help them find what they need.
Call us if we can help assist your family on a practical but important decision for the family.