Anne Tumlinson

 by Anne Tumlinson

Medicare Therapy Rules Made Easy

Most of us take for granted that we can get out of bed in the morning and do all the things necessary to head out and face our day. You know… the simple everyday things like moving around our house, showering, getting dressed and eating breakfast. I might be a little foggy most mornings but I don’t think about whether I’ll face an enormous challenge in measuring out the coffee or pouring the milk. The point is the routine is just that…routine.

But if your parent is frail, you know that there’s nothing routine about these activities — that for them, doing even the simplest things just can’t be taken for granted anymore.

The mobility and functioning that’s essential to independence and safety suddenly becomes a big effort. And, Daughterhood really happens when we have to get involved in helping our parents do the things that they can no longer do by themselves. This is when their lives and ours get hard.

Read More›
in Assisted Living / Common Challenges / Home Care / Medicaid / Medicare / Paying for Care / Resources / Uncategorized / Your Parent's Hospitalization 53 comments
 by Anne Tumlinson

A Go-To Guide For Understanding Your Aging Parents’ Rehabilitation

I was 30 weeks pregnant with my daughter when a routine doctor’s visit uncovered the fact that a disconnected placenta had cut her off from getting food and water. Essentially, she was starving in utero. Later that same day, my girl was born by emergency C-section weighing in at just over 2 pounds.

Her early birth kicked off years of specialized healthcare and education, most of which was therapy to help her walk, talk and manipulate the tools she’d need to do even the simplest things like eat, use a pencil, and play with her toys.

I’m happy to report that today she’s a strapping 5’7” teenager who plays softball and the piano. And, while her gritty personality had a lot to do with her success, so did the physical, occupational and speech therapists working with her.

Read More›
in Assisted Living / Common Challenges / Feeling Overwhelmed / Medicaid / Medicare / Paying for Care / Resources / Uncategorized 3 comments
 by Anne Tumlinson

Creating a Resilient Response to Loss: The Special Challenge of Dementia

I’ve said many times that few things are more disorienting than the shift from being cared for by your parents to caring for your parents. The only thing that makes it harder is when your parent (or spouse) has dementia. This is quite possibly the most challenging of all situations.

Every Sunday, I allow myself the pleasure of spending time on Krista Tippett’s website, www.onbeing.org. A couple of weeks ago, I stumbled onto a podcast entitled, “The Myth of Closure” with family therapist Pauline Boss.

She’s coined the phrase “ambiguous loss,” which I find revelatory. Ambiguous loss refers to “a loss that is unclear, that has no resolution or closure”…. Where a loved one’s “status as absent or present remains hazy.”

Read More›
in Common Challenges / End-of-Life / Feeling Overwhelmed / Navigating Change and Letting Go / Resources / Uncategorized 8 comments
 by Anne Tumlinson

What to Do When Your Best Efforts Aren’t Good Enough

My neighbor George is not a daughter but he’s certainly part of the daughterhood. You see, until a year ago, he spent most of his time taking care of his parents in the home they shared.

Now, from my perspective, he was the best kind of son any parents could hope to have and he fully embodied the spirit of honoring your mother and father.

But from his perspective, he was constantly failing.

Once he relayed a story to me about how he was in the kitchen one night making dinner for his parents – both bed bound in different rooms upstairs. As he’s running the food trays up and down the stairs, as he did for every meal, suddenly his mother calls out, “Come sit with me.”

Read More›
in Assisted Living / End-of-Life / Feeling Guilty / Feeling Overwhelmed / Navigating Change and Letting Go / Uncategorized 6 comments
 by Anne Tumlinson

A Daughter’s Guide to Hiring the Right Aging Care Professional

Recently when I was talking to a friend about daughterhood, she asked me, “Why isn’t there someone I can pay to help me figure out how to get the best care for my mom? You know, someone who can help me navigate the system.”

That’s a really good question. There are, in fact, many different types of professionals you can hire to help out when your parent needs care.

One problem, though, is that, many of the daughters I know are reluctant to pay out of pocket for –- sometimes expensive –- professionals to perform tasks that they feel they should be able to do themselves.

Read More›
in Uncategorized 6 comments
 by Anne Tumlinson

Are You Ready to Make Healthcare Decisions for Your Parents? Six Steps to Prepare You Now

A reality of our healthcare system is that it’s really good at keeping people alive way past the point that they’re aware of being alive.

As a result, our parents stand a good chance of ending up in either a healthcare crisis or end-of-life situation where they can’t speak for themselves or make the big decisions that will determine the course of their treatment.

That means YOU are the person who will likely have to make these very hard decisions on their behalf. No pressure, right?

Clearly, this is a LOT  of pressure. So, the question is: How do you get ready? You may have already heard about things like advance directives, living wills, doctor’s orders, power of attorney, healthcare proxy, and on and on. All the things that people SHOULD do to prepare for advanced illness and end-of-life.

The problem is it’s all really intimidating and more than a little bit overwhelming.

Read More›
in End-of-Life 0 comments
 by Anne Tumlinson

3 Strategies to Overcome the Most Stressful Part of Daughterhood

There is almost nothing in life more stressful than feeling like you are 100 percent responsible for a situation over which you have zero control.

This is happening a lot these days in my house because somehow, somewhere, my daughter has grown into a teenager and I’ve lost control of all but the biggest decisions in her life.

At least she’s my daughter and I am nominally in charge. So as stressful as it is, it’s only a fraction of the stress women face when they feel like they’re entirely responsible for their parents’ health and safety, but, at the same time, have no control over their parents behavior or the choices they make.

This is a recipe for a nervous breakdown — when you have all of the responsibility but none of the authority!

Read More›
in Navigating Change and Letting Go 13 comments
 by Anne Tumlinson

The 3 Unexpected Stages of Daughterhood

I have spent the last few weeks talking to new Daughterhood Circle leaders. And, even though they live all over the country – from New Jersey to North Carolina to Texas and Minnesota — it’s AMAZING how many of the things they experience are exactly the same.

I mean it’s uncanny how similarly our leaders talk about their lives! Just within a couple of days, (I swear this is true) I talked to two women — both caring for their mothers at home and simultaneously raising kids — and they each talked about how much it means to them to be taking care of their mothers. And, then… each one of them, separately used these exact words:

“Sometimes, though, I have to go out to the backyard and scream.”

You can picture women all over America standing in their kitchens coaxing teenagers to do homework, trying to get their 85-year-old-moms-with-dementia to eat, and, in their calmest voice, they’re like, “excuse me a minute everyone” and off they go outside to just have a Moment.

Read More›
in Common Challenges / Feeling Overwhelmed 5 comments