R138: Lessons in Long-Term Caring

This Reading Course explores how therapists can deal with long-term care issues in their own families and with their clients. Katy Butler gives an intimate sense of the perfect storm of emotional and practical problems that engulfs the adult children of sick, elderly parents, as well as some hard-learned advice for rising to the occasion with grace and sanity intact. Barry Jacobs describes the complex situations raised for a therapist trying to help a family in which a loved one is dying—a process is not helped by sentimentalized ideas about “the good death.” He also advises therapists on how to encourage older, frail clients and their family caregivers to accept the help they need. In another article, Jacobs warns therapists against proffering advice too quickly without showing genuine understanding and compassion for the moral dimensions of the caregiver’s dilemma. David Seaburn explores the process of helping a couple confront the coming death of the wife. Robert Hill describes how therapists can help their aging clients make the most of the years they have left.

Course Readings

Re-feathering the Nest: From Dutiful Daughter to Self-Aware Caregiver by Katy Butler

Caring for the Caregiver by Katy Butler

Reliable Witness: What it Takes to Be with Your Clients to the End by Barry Jacobs

Winter Passage: Acknowledging Spirituality in Life’s Final Journey by David Seaburn

Positive Aging: A New Paradigm For Growing Old by Robert Hill

Receiving with Grace: Teaching Reluctant Seniors to Accept Help by Barry Jacobs

Honoring the Mission: Don’t Be Too Quick to Ease the Caregiver’s Burden by Barry Jacobs

Learning Objectives

1. Discuss some of the difficulties and rewards of becoming a caregiver for your parents.
2. Explain how therapists can help clients and their families deal with the grief surrounding their own death.
3. Describe the role that spirituality can play in helping clients deal with death and dying.
4. List three effective strategies that can be used when working with caregivers.