It can be off-putting to experience some of the emotions your elderly family member might be feeling at the end of her life, particularly if one of those emotions is anger. There are reasons for that anger, and you may have to help your senior through it.
Don’t Try to Change Her Feelings
Often a first, knee-jerk response to anger from an elderly family member is to try to convince her to feel differently. But depending on her circumstances, anger may be completely reasonable and it may be something she needs to process in order to heal and to accept her situation. Anger might not be how you would respond, but this is her life and she feels the way that she feels. What’s more important is for you to validate her feelings and avoid trying to tell her they’re wrong or that she should feel differently.
See What’s Behind the Feeling
It’s especially important if you don’t understand your senior’s anger to try to understand what’s behind that emotion for her. She may have planned a very different experience for the end of her life or she might feel anger at being out of control, period. There are a million reasons why she might be experiencing anger and if you talk to her, she may start to share with you what factors into such a strong emotion.
Deal with Your Own Feelings Separately
Something else that you need to do is to remember to keep your feelings out of this. You’re going to need to deal with your own emotions separately, even if you’re feeling anger as well and for the same reasons as your senior. Remember that even if she’s taking her anger out on you, that doesn’t mean that her feelings truly have anything to do with you.
Make Sure She’s Able to Process How She’s Feeling
Processing her emotions is the most important part of all of this. If your senior isn’t able to do that, she’s going to continue to feel angry and that’s no way to spend the time she has left. Hospice care providers can help you to find resources and solutions that help her to find the way through her anger that she needs to find.
Hospice care can help with so much else, too. When you don’t have the energy or the expertise to handle specific tasks for your senior, they can step in. They can also help to ensure that she’s comfortable and that her quality of life is where it should be.
If you are or a loved one is considering hospice elder care in Atlanta, GA, please call the caring staff at Arcturus Hospice and Palliative Care today. Call 678-383-9973 today to speak to our care team.
Kate Gorinshteyn is the director of marketing at Arcturus Health Care. Arcturus is a fast-growing Hospice striving to provide the highest level of quality care to patients faced with life-limiting illnesses. Our goal is to make each patient as pain-free as possible and give physiological, emotional and spiritual support to both the patient and family. We understand that the decision change from curative to comfort care is difficult, and our team is trained to help you every step of the way!
We are proud to make a difference in the lives of those we serve.