Fathers and Sons: Under the Same Roof with Elderly Relatives

2024 Author: James Gerald | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 14:00

Did you realize that regular trips to your grandmother take too much time and effort, and you suggested that she move in with you? Well, the act is worthy of respect - now an elderly relative will always be there, and you can help your beloved granny, so to speak, without leaving the cash register. However, be prepared for the fact that getting rid of physical difficulties, you gain others - psychological.

As a child, we came to our grandparents on vacation, and they enveloped us with care: they fed us pancakes and pies to the bone, allowed us to watch TV late and enthusiastically told the stories of their youth. Elderly relatives were for us the personification of gentleness, wisdom and kindness, but everything changed when we ourselves became adults: good advice now seems intrusive, and sweet discontent with the modern political system - eternal and completely unreasonable grumbling. We begin to get annoyed, we do not have enough patience to once again explain to grandmother why we do not wear warm leggings with fleece and do not eat after 18.00. But it's one thing to argue with your beloved granny during rare meetings, it is quite another to live in a common living space and swear for any reason. If you happen to share an apartment with elderly relatives, then you, like no one else, know that such a neighborhood is a serious test for both “fathers” and “children”.

The old people are sure that no one hears them, and therefore they repeat everything several times.

It's no easier for them

No one greets old age with a smile and open arms. People are afraid to grow old, because wilting says only one thing - life is over. That is why most people of age are so touchy, nervous and embittered: they look back with sadness at the past years, realize their mistakes, feel their own uselessness, suffer from unfulfilled plans. It’s no easier for them than for us, the young. The old people are sure that no one hears them, and therefore they repeat everything several times. They want to warn us against the "rake" that they themselves stepped on, but we perceive their advice as boring lectures and brush it off, believing that we know better how to do it. As a result, we reap: painful touchiness, pursed lips, constant quarrels and mutual misunderstandings. In addition, older people are very afraid of being addicted: they are afraid of their own helplessness and the prospect of being alone.

The most important thing is the weather in the house

It is you who will have to make some concessions to keep the peace in the family. Fortunately, psychologists assure that it is not so difficult to make friends with elderly relatives, the main thing is to follow some rules of communication.

1. Be patient. It is unlikely that you can convince a stubborn child that the toy that he desperately wants to get, he does not need. Most likely, after a short persuasion, you will give up, remembering that in front of you there is, albeit a whimsical, but your most beloved child. The same goes for older relatives: be patient and always remember how many good things they have done in life.

It is you who will have to make some concessions to keep the peace in the family.

2. We will all be like that. Do not forget that your old age is not far off. One day you, too, will feel lonely and unnecessary and most of all at this moment you will dream of attention from children and grandchildren. Therefore, treat elderly relatives the way you would like your children to treat you.

3. Don't argue. To be honest, arguing with a confident grandmother is a useless exercise. It is much better to calmly agree with her arguments and silently do it in your own way. Especially if the subject of the conversation does not particularly concern her. However, do not neglect the advice of elderly relatives - they are often useful.

4. Communicate. It is very important for elderly relatives to know that they are remembered and asked for their opinion. It is much better to talk to your grandmother over a cup of tea than to pay off her with expensive gifts. Although, of course, such signs of attention are also needed, but they will not replace the beauty of a lively conversation, during which you ask her for advice and talk about the difficulties at work.

5. Remain calm. If an elderly relative seems to you too aggressive, and you do not see reasons for aggression, then do not even try to appeal to his conscience - nothing good will come of it anyway. Instead of unnecessary preachings, choose the tactics of psychological distancing - imagine that this aggression does not concern you, because in moments of anger you are under an invisible glass dome that protects you from negativity.

6. Do not drive them out of the kitchen. You think that you yourself are able to cook dinner and wash the dishes, and do not want to burden your grandmother. However, perhaps it is the household chores that your grandma needs so much. Give her a choice: she wants to sit on the couch and watch TV - let her sit, but if she rushes to the kitchen to treat her family with delicious pies - why not please her grandmother and free the "machine"? Let her feel needed and find something to do. It will become calmer both for her and for you.

Of course, not all problems are easy to solve. Sometimes elderly relatives turn to insults, deliberately cause guilt in children, shamelessly climb into someone else's life, do not even trust relatives and friends, blaming them for anything, manipulate with stories about poor health, and it is not always possible to recognize this manipulation. In each case, an individual approach is needed, but, perhaps, one thing unites them - attention to the elderly person. It is capable of making even the most absurd old man an understanding relative.