Carolyn L. Rosenblatt, RN, Attorney, Mediator

Every 6 seconds someone turns 60. That also suggests that every 60 seconds, someone’s aging parent turned 80, 85, or more.

There’s a sea of us with aging parents who are presenting all manner of challenges for us Boomers. One of the most daunting is the necessity to interface with siblings. Maybe we never got along. Maybe we’ve been estranged for a few years. Whatever it is, we find ourselves having to make decisions we never considered making.

Does Mom or Dad have enough money to live on? What about paying for help at home? Who is going to be the caregiver when an aging parent requires our involvement? There are disagreements about who makes the financial decisions. There are disagreements about what kind of care a parent needs and how it should be paid for.

We at AgingParents.com are advocates for the family meeting. We think it’s a great place to start the process of ironing out the difficulties with siblings who in one way or another share the role of addressing aging parents’ needs. Part of our work is to conduct family meetings.
Consider these alternatives:

• If you and your siblings don’t do well face-to-face, try email as a start. Keep it objective and don’t personalize anything with a sibling who has never stepped up in the past. Test the waters.

• If the siblings can meet by phone, that’s even better. It allows for exchange of ideas and efforts at problem-solving that can’t be done as well by email.

• The best way to get everyone on board is the in-person family meeting, which can be done after any family occasion, or before, if all are willing to plan for setting the time aside. If you shudder at this thought, here’s a quick way to learn techniques to stay sane through any family meeting.

• You can download in a few minutes a 39 page instruction manual, How to Handle Family Conflicts About Elders. You can also get it in print. Find it here: http://agingparents.com/products/information/364-how-to-handle-family-conflicts-about-elders

When you’ve got more confidence about this subject of dealing with your siblings, it will be easier to show some leadership in your family. Whether you parent is turning 80, 90 or beyond, you’ll know what to do.

© 2010, AgingParents.com

Dad and His Two Sons: Where Did the Money Go?

By Carolyn L. Rosenblatt, R.N., elder law attorney, mediator, AgingParents.com

Imagine this: two sons agreed to keep Dad’s inheritance in the bank for safekeeping. He’s a disabled vet. He has trouble handling money and trusts his adult sons to help him, and watch over the funds. Sons promptly spend whatever they want, select a neighbors dad as their “financial adviser” to invest the rest of the money, and no surprise, it’s all soon gone.

Dad is now living in poverty. Sons are going to school, or working, having a good time and seem to be entirely disinterested in their father’s fate.

Is this about greed? Of course. Is it about a sense of entitlement by the sons to do whatever they wanted with Dad’s money? Yep. What have we come to when we think of a parent as a “throwaway” person who does not deserve our concern and care? The sons seemed to have no idea of a duty to their father to be sure he would not struggle in poverty.

This situation is real. The Dad called us at AgingParents.com in hope of mediating the case with his sons. Our jobs as mediators are to remain neutral, to suggest solutions, to help the parties work out a plan to resolve the conflict. Dad wanted the sons to pay him back for what they had taken, buying new cars, traveling and having a grand old time. They didn’t have his permission to deplete the funds.

The sons did not care to really participate in problem- solving with their Dad. They met, but would not offer any cooperation with trying to fix the situation. Dad didn’t want to sue them and he generally gave up. It was quite sad. The best we could do was to get them all to agree to keep talking and to work on re-establishing their relationships.

This is an example of financial elder abuse. It came about as a result of many factors. First, Dad made a dumb decision to just give all the money to his sons, in their early 20’s. What was he expecting? Neither had proven themselves to be particularly skilled or wise about handling money, much less Dad’s money. He might have put it in a trust and had a qualified trustee manage it for him. Yes, it would have cost fees to do that but the trustee has a legal duty to do what is right for the person who owns the trust.

Another factor in the financial abuse was the opportunity it gave the sons, who obviously did not understand that the funds weren’t for their own enjoyment. Communication was either lacking or poor. Nothing was ever put in writing.

A third factor was that the sons chose an unqualified “advisor” to invest the money for them. They knew him but did not educate themselves about his qualifications nor his track record. He made very poor choices and lost the remaining money on bad investments. Dad would have been better off with a conservative investment in bonds or other low-risk choice. An experienced and qualified financial adviser is a must when a large sum of money is at stake for any elder.

We think this is a somewhat unusual situation. Yes there will always be greedy kids. However, we see many honorable, loving, trustworthy adult children stepping up to do the right thing with an aging parent’s money. We encourage, acknowledge, and applaud those adult children. For many of us in the caregiver role, handling an aging parent’s funds is one of the caregiver’s jobs. If you are spending your hours at night or on weekends watching over your aging parent’s accounting, paying bills, minding the books,, we respect what you’re doing. The time it takes, the attention you give it is an act of caring. You are truly honoring your loved ones and are making the world a better place.

©2010, AgingParents.com.

By Carolyn L. Rosenblatt, RN, BSN, Attorney

Mom has dementia and her daughter, Jennie, is worried.  Mom clearly should not be driving anymore. 
Jennie finally just took the keys away.  Have they talked about it? No. Argued some, maybe. But talking starts out with anger and ends up worse than ever.

Jennie saw the dents in Mom’s car and asked about what happened.  Mom refused to discuss it. First of all, she doesn’t exactly remember.  But she’s embarrassed. She had a perfect driving record.  Not even a parking ticket. Now this. Something is happening to her memory and keeping track of things.  She doesn’t want anyone to find out.  It feels horrible to Mom.  What if they put her away?

Jennie threatens to stop Mom from doing something stupid.  Mom wants Jennie to butt out.  How dare she tell her own Mother what to do?  Can this be solved?

This scenario is real.  It’s also not uncommon.  The problem of how to approach a person who may have a vague idea of something wrong with their memory but won’t admit it is affecting thousands of families every day.  Driving is one area where memory problems can affect lives and can put the public, as well as an aging parent in danger.

Consider the concept of mediation of a family dispute about an aging parent’s driving.

Mediation is a way of resolving disputes of all kinds. We’re quick to say “use mediation” for a labor dispute, or between warring countries to bring about peace. But, we usually don’t think of it for situations like Jennie and her Mom.  However, it can bring hope when conversations and arguing end up in a standoff and anger is destroying family relationships.  There is a way to resolve even the stickiest family issues.

Think of mediation as a way to get an outside, skilled person trained in resolving conflicts to come to your aid.  Think of it as a way to end the fighting, and to work out solutions with help and guidance.  Sometimes a few simple suggestions you’ve never thought about can turn the tide of a family conflict.  People who do this are called “elder mediators” or even “family mediators”.  The process is elder mediation.  People come to their own resolution with the help of a mediator.

You can find one by doing a search in your area for mediators who work with elders and their families.  There is normally a fee, though some community mediation services provide mediation at low cost or free.  If your family is suffering over a driving issue, or any other elder-related issue, think of mediation.  It may be the way out you’re looking for.

To learn more about adult children and dangerous older drivers, see my article in Forbes.com.
To download a short book with step-by-step guidance on how to deal with your aging parent’s driving, try How to Handle a Dangerous Older Driver .

By Carolyn L. Rosenblatt, nurse-attorney, mediator

We recently mediated a case involving a 70-something man and a 20-something woman who had been living in the same house. The relationship had boiled into a lawsuit.  It was not a sexual relationship; rather, it was two people who were probably using each to deal with the pain in their own lonely lives. It ended badly and elder financial abuse was alleged.  There were two lawyers, both trying to do right by their clients.  Lots of bitter feelings were expressed.  After a long day of negotiations at AgingParents.com, we were able to provide a solution, with the mediators shuttling back and forth between the parties and their lawyers.  The mediator’s creative suggestion to trade a car and money to make it go away worked.

We observed that this was a lawsuit that should never have happened.  Neither party was free of blame.  The most compelling thing to me was how loneliness drove them both to be in an unhealthy relationship together that ended up a mess.  Can’t we do better than that?  Addressing loneliness is doable without damaging yourself.

In an earlier post on this blog, we show you a video of my mother-in-law, Alice, who is 88 years old. She’s a widow who had a wonderful 62 years of marriage.  She wanted to die too when she lost her husband, the pain of loss was so great.   She managed to find reasons to live, her family among those reasons.  Loneliness is always a problem, but she has learned to fight it.

We’re pretty proud of Alice. She’s a survivor. She takes field trips offered at her retirement community. Today they’re at a golf tournament. She goes out to dinner with a group after the meetings of her “bereavement group”, comprised of others who have lost a spouse or partner. She listens to audiobooks on her iPod.  She goes on vacation with us.  She even went out to dinner by herself for the first time ever and it was okay.  She takes herself to the movies. She goes to the gym. She takes a current events class. We’re so grateful that she’s able to get around on her own, and she makes the most of it.  “I count my blessings every day”, she says.  Now there’s a guy in the picture.

She’s not crazy about him, but he’s company for some things. Hey, the guy drives at night and she doesn’t.  All in all, we know Alice won’t do anything stupid like the poor fellow in the lawsuit whose case we mediated.  We’re involved. We watch out for her. My husband calls his Mom every evening, to check in.  It’s that kind of caring that makes the world a better place.

If your aging parent is widowed, they need you.  Yes, even if they weren’t the best parent possible, or even if you don’t love their company.  Taking the time to call your aging parent,  every day, even for a few minutes, is a pretty easy way to stay connected, safeguard against the feeling of isolation that can come with widowhood, and to do the right thing.

As for Alice, she’s already planning her next vacation. Wouldn’t you love to be like that at age 88?

© 2010 AgingParents.com

Carolyn L. Rosenblatt, RN, BSN, Attorney

Here at AgingParents.com, we see a lot of problems involving families of aging parents and their adult children.  Often, the daughter or daughter-in-law is the one asking for help.  Daughters-in-law sometimes tell us that they feel that they must walk on eggshells.  Their spouses may not have a good relationship with mom or dad.  They are the conduits for help and good communication.  It is sometimes surprising to see how a daughter-in-law, and sometimes a son-in-law has a better relationship with the aging parent than their spouse does.

Maybe the complexity of relating to  parent is less for those who came to the relationship with the elder later in their lives.  Maybe the in-law adult child has fewer issues, more courage, and possibly, feels there is less to lose by speaking out. Sometimes sons have trouble taking charge of Mom.  They have resistance to dealing with the fact that Mom’s competency is failing. Whatever the reason, we have the deepest regard for those dutiful, respectful daughters-in-law (or sons) when we meet them.  They are true peacemakers.

We think the daughter or son-in law’s voice does, indeed count.  Often as not, they are the ones who want to get a conflict out in the open and to work on it.  We have yet to see a son coming to AgingParents.com for help with conflict resolution, a service we offer families.  It’s always been the daughter, or daughter-in-law.
For those out there who are in that role, keep reaching out, keep being the voice of reason, keep looking for ways to solve the family’s difficulty when your spouse can’t seem to get off the dime.  Your mother/father-in-law is lucky to have you.

© 2010, AgingParents.com

By Carolyn Rosenblatt, RN, Attorney, Mediator

When 3 sisters are in conflict about how to take care of Dad, is there any way to stop the fighting? One shares power over finances with Dad. Dad is making some pretty crazy decisions lately. He’s 88, partially blind, lives alone, has memory loss, gets lost on his way home, and oh, yes, he still has a driver’s license. Is anyone in charge here??

Working with families can be a challenge, especially when siblings don’t trust each other. A conversation tends to deteriorate into ancient family history about who said what 40 years ago. They will take each other on and forget the problem at hand: Dad!

Aging parents can be hard for anyone, particularly when the elder won’t give up control of anything. Dad says, I’m ready for help, but no, on second thought, I’m not. Let’s go ahead and sell the house, but, wait, I’ve changed my mind. I think I’ll live with my daughter, but no, I don’t want to. I do have some memory problems, but there’s really no problem. Sound familiar?

Families can get very bogged down in the question of how to handle the elder who needs help but isn’t ready to accept it. Perhaps adult children themselves are having trouble facing how much help Dad needs and are making excuses for the danger signs they see. They react to each other, get polarized against each other and forget that they have a common goal: to help their aging parent stay safe at home, or wherever is best.

A mediator can do much to help them get back on track. A series of family meetings by conference call with an elder mediator can work quite well to focus the family members on the most important tasks. A mediator can sometimes be a referee, breaking up the argument, and refocusing attention on how to solve a problem. A mediator can keep order, let everyone be heard, and repeat any agreements that are made so everyone understands them.

If this hassle we’re describing sounds like someone you know, consider mediation. It is an efficient way to reduce conflict among family members, and is a whole lot cheaper than hiring lawyers and having siblings suing each other.

We all want to believe that we can handle the problems in our own families without any outside help. Getting a professional mediator into the mix might feel embarrassing to some. Others will complain that it’s too expensive. But consider the cost of any lawsuit: thousands and thousands of dollars just to get rolling.

Lawyers representing you for an hourly fee will be very happy to keep doing work and keep getting paid. Most litigators are not trained to resolve conflicts as they arise; they’re trained to be your vigorous advocates. No matter how you look at it, mediation is cheaper than any lawsuit. And it’s way less stressful, too.
© 2010, AgingParents.com

Elder Mediation: A Solution for Families at War

Elder Mediation-a Solution for Families at War looks at a typical family conflict over the care of an aging parent, and shows how a mediator can help bring disputing siblings together together.

When Siblings Are Stuck in Disagreement

Carolyn L. Rosenblatt, R.N., B.S.N., Attorney
Aging Parents.com

This is a case study of a real situation, though the names and details are changed to protect confidentiality.

Two sisters are arguing and in extended conflict about the care of their mother. One sibling, a middle aged woman we’ll call Nellie, lives at mom’s home with mom, and doesn’t work. She takes care of mom, but not very well. The other sister, whom we’ll call Mary, is worried about Nellie’s unstable mental health, and that she isn’t bathing mom properly or watching her closely enough. Mom has dementia. She’s declining slowly, and can’t be left alone.

Nellie has access to two of mom’s bank accounts, even though she does not have power of attorney over mom.
Nellie is very emotionally unstable.

Mary tried to mediate the conflict with Nellie, and Nellie did appear at mediation. Nellie made all sorts of agreements, such as having a professional caregiver come in several hours a week, to check on mom and help out. Then, she refused to sign the “settlement agreement” document, and went back on her word with everything she said she would do.

Nellie wants money, and isn’t satisfied with mom’s income supporting her. She wants to get paid, too.

Mary has the durable power of attorney for finances. What can Mary do now?

Because Mary has the right to control mom’s finances, she can take Nellie off the bank accounts, except for the amount required for monthly living expenses. If Nellie wants more money, Mary can see to it that she will only receive it if she complies with the things she agreed to do at mediation.

Mary has a legal right to control all the bank accounts, and a duty to protect her mom from Nellie raiding the bank accounts for extras she doesn’t actually need. Nellie spends money on herself from mom’s bank accounts.

If Mary can get over her fear of Nellie, and do what her job as power of attorney requires of her, she will be better off. Mom will be taken care of by someone besides Nellie, and Mary will then have “eyes and ears” in mom’s home to help her keep mom safe. Nellie can continue to help care for mom for as long as she is able to help, but Nellie needs an extra hand with bathing mom, and other chores.

This is an ongoing conflict for which control over the mom’s money is key to keeping things stable. Mary is upset, but is able to do what has to be done. She doesn’t want to upset her sister, who is not stable to start with, but is at least able to provide some help for mom. The compromise is somewhat under duress for Nellie, but is workable, even if Nellie isn’t totally happy with it. Mary is a responsible person, and is on the right track.
© 2009, AgingParents.com
Post #10

What Feeds Family Conflict?

By Carolyn L. Rosenblatt, R.N., B.S.N., Attorney at Law

There are a lot of kinds of conflict, but some of the very worst are the kind that occur in families. Why is this? A long history of interacting in ways that don’t work, family members who are totally closed to change, lack of self-awareness and self-understanding, and fear are among the things that can maintain patterns of conflict for years on end.

Psychology teaches us that all behavior is motivated. That is to say, from that perspective, everything we do comes from some reason, some conscious or unconscious place within. If people behave unreasonably, there is a cause for their behavior. Knowing that may not change a thing about family conflict, but it can help us deal with it a little better. Dealing with family conflict is essential as our elders age and family members have to step up and make decisions about aging parents.  Everyone may not get along so well in this situation.

In our practice of elder mediation, fear seems to be the single biggest motivator that drives the conflicts we see. It can be fear around money, or control, or change. It can be fear of being found out, exposed. It can be fear of being asked to do something one is not competent or willing to do. It is one of the most basic of human emotions, but an emotion that causes extreme self-protective reactions. These reactions sometimes manifest in strong words, violent behavior, or generally hostile contact with others.
Mediators work to help participants at mediation find ways to agree and to make compromises. The stronger a participant’s fear, the more difficult it is for that person to give in to anything, or to make agreements that touch upon his or her fear.

What can we do about all this? Perhaps we can start by recognizing that no one enjoys being horribly difficult at mediation or any time. Behaving badly is simply what shows on the outside. What just might be on the inside is a person frightened of losing control, security, money, the family home, an inheritance, the right to make decisions, or anything.

Compassion and understanding can do a lot to uplift the process of working with persons who are showing their worst side in a dispute. It does not change the difficult person’s behavior, but it can cause the whole tone of a mediation to soften. Understanding that emotion feeds conflict can cause one to step back and try to imagine what it is like to be the person who is acting out.

If one is able to imagine that, to “walk in someone else’s shoes” for the moment, it makes it a lot easier to compromise or try to figure out what would work for that difficult person. I guess you can call it being a little less selfish in a dispute.

It works. This, of course doesn’t apply only to mediation of disputes involving elders. It’s a general concept, and can apply to any kind of conflict. Difficult as it is to see the other’s side of the story in any clash of ideas, working at doing just that is essential to getting things resolved.

At the risk of sounding too philosophical here, I conclude that elder mediation can uplift us if we are willing to put forth the effort to stop thinking of only our own point of view. It’s not easy. The upside to the effort is that your dispute could be over with, or at least down to a workable level. Were we all able to see past the specifics of a family conflict to the underlying emotions we would surely be more peaceful.

To learn more about family conflicts and aging loved ones, sign up for our free newsletter at http://www.AgingParents.com.

© 2009, AgingParents.com

What Makes a Good Mediator?

By Carolyn L. Rosenblatt, R.N., B.S.N., Attorney at Law

Is it taking the right kind of training? No, because then every trained person would be good at the job and we know that’s not true. Training helps, of course, but there’s more to it.

Is it knowing the law? No, because there are many wonderful mediators who are not lawyers. So, it’s not just about knowledge. Is it subject matter expertise if it’s not about the law? To some extent, subject matter expertise is very helpful and does contribute to being a good mediator. People tend to honor the suggestions of someone who has expertise. But it’s not everything, because we know that everyone who is knowledgeable in a field isn’t necessarily cut out to be a good mediator.

Then, what is it that makes a good mediator?

I think, based on participating in mediation over many years, both as an advocate and as a mediator, that a good mediator is largely a quality of character. It takes excellent listening skills, patience, the ability to see both or all sides of a dispute, and the ability to lead. If people were able to work things out by themselves, they wouldn’t seek mediators. Participants in mediation need someone to lead them to their own solutions without causing them to feel forced.

We know how it feels to be persuaded to do something and eventually to agree to do it. Most of us also know how it feels to be bullied or pushed against our will. A good mediator will persuade without forcing it, and urge without pushing to the point of being overbearing. That is a particular kind of leadership.

To me, one of the most important qualities a mediator needs besides leadership is that of being respectful of everyone, and being even-handed. If the mediator even hints of being partial to one side or the other in a conflict, the party who senses that is going to lose respect for the mediator. It’s pretty hard to persuade anyone to see things from a different vantage point if you lose their respect.

Another quality I value highly in a mediator is creativity in devising suggestions about how to reach compromises. Unconventional ideas can bear fruit. The mediator can come up with a tack no one else thought about before, as they were so involved in the dispute as to be stuck in it. Fighting doesn’t particularly lend itself to creativity.  Persistence is part of creativity.  When you hit impasse, you keep trying to figure out a new angle, to get the parties to see something differently, or try another way.

Finally, I think a great mediator puts people at ease, simply by good communication skills. There will be more on this blog about communication skills in the future, as it’s one of my favorite subjects. For now, let’s just say communication skills involve a mediator acknowledging what a person has said or tried to say, empowering people to express themselves honestly, and supporting efforts to move forward from where they started in the fight at hand.

Simply put, this quality of character we’re talking about here is a lot about being a nice person who expresses interest and attention to each of the parties. Add to that, a good mediator uses skill, techniques, effort, care, and the power of one’s presence to help disputing parties find their way out.

Certainly some of this can be learned. However, I’m not sure one can learn character. If you’re a mediator, or an aspiring one, look within. If you possess some or all of these things above described, you’re on the right track.

If you’re in need of a mediator, and looking for one, there is simply no way to assess these things without talking to the potential mediator. Ask if the mediator uses pre-mediation conferences. That means you get to talk to him or her before the mediation happens. Size the mediator up. Look for these qualities of character the best you can. Be assured you won’t see them on the mediator’s resume. It’s a “vibe” you get. Trust it.
© 2009 AgingParents.com