What NOT to Say to someone with Alzheimer’s

If you stop saying these things to a person with a dementia like Alzheimer’s, your struggles with communication and behavior problems will reduce.

1. Never say, “Do you remember me?
   This immediately says to the person, “I’m testing you” and they will get nervous and fail. Instead say, “I’m Jane, the therapist” or “I’m Susan, your daughter.”


2. Never argue.
   Arguing makes them dig in their heels. Instead agree or ask questions “Yes, this winter (even if it’s August) sure is hot.”
   


3.  Never try to reason
   They literally can’t reason like they used to before the dementia. It won’t work like it used to, or like you want it to. Instead give choices “Do you want to eat lunch now or in ½ hour?”
   


4. Never say “You are home”
   They have gone back in time and they are referring to a home they lived in long ago. Instead, validate their feelings, tell them they are safe and/or ask their favorite thing about their home.
   


5. Never say “I told you…”
   When you say this you are saying “You are a moron who can’t remember things.” Instead, simply repeat what you’ve already said a gazillion times before.

So try these and see the difference!

If you are struggling with a family member with a dementia like Alzheimer's give me a call at 206-769-8108 and I can help you walk through the disease.

"The only appropriate response to vulnerability is reverence"

True.

I was recently at another training for my favorite mode of therapy--CIMBS, and someone said this quote.  Sadly, I don't know whose words they originally were. 

If you want to find out more about CIMBS, go to http://www.complexintegrationmbs.com/

More Pema Chodron--HOW TO DEFEAT FEAR

Once there was a young warrior. Her teacher told her that she had to do battle with fear. She didn’t want to do that. It seemed too aggressive; it was scary; it seemed unfriendly. But the teacher said she had to do it and gave instructions for the battle.

The day arrived. The student warrior stood on one side, and fear stood on the other. The warrior was feeling very small, and fear was looking big and wrathful. The young warrior roused herself and went toward fear, prostrated three times, and asked, “May I have permission to go into battle with you?”

Fear said, “Thank you for showing me so much respect that you ask permission.”

Then the young warrior said, “How can I defeat you?”

Fear replied, “My weapons are that I talk fast, and I get very close to your face. Then you get completely unnerved, and you do whatever I say. If you don’t do what I tell you, I have no power. You can listen to me, and you can have respect for me. You can even be convinced by me. But if you don’t do what I say, I have no power.”

In that way, the student warrior learned how to defeat fear.

(From The Pocket Pema Chodron)

I'm In the Media!

I am pleased to say that a company for which I used to work, Screen Inc., which developed a computerized screening measure for mild cognitive impairment, was mentioned in Newsweek.  The name of the measure is the CANS-MCI.  I published the article which Newsweek says established their reliability and validity


To view the article, go to: http://www.newsweek.com/id/236293

It is fun to touch base with my academic background every once in awhile!

From Pema Chodron...words to live by.

"When we start to meditate or to work with any kind of spiritual discipline,we often think that somehow we're going to improve, which is a subtle aggression against who we really are. It's a bit like saying, "If I jog I'll be a much better person." "If I had a nicer house I'd be a better person." "If I could meditate and calm down I'd be a better person." Or the scenario may be that we find fault with others. We might say, "If it weren't for my husband I'd have a perfect marriage." "If it weren't for the fact that my boss and I can't get on, my job would be just great." And, "If it weren't for my mind, my meditation would be just excellent."
But loving-kindness ~maitri~ towards ourselves doesn't mean getting rid of anything. Maitri means that we can still be crazy, we can still be angry. We can still be timid or jealous or full of feelings of unworthiness. Meditation practice isn't about trying to throw ourselves away and become something better. It's about befriending who we are already."

from Comfortable With Uncertainty

A Simple Way to Help

A quote from a movie I saw "God's only requirement is that you let others know they are not alone." How simple. How profound. How easy. How difficult when we don't know it ourselves...how healing to know it ourselves, because we let others know.

Life Learning

When I was in graduate school, getting my PhD, I read a study that found that college students could be as beneficial to clients as could people with Masters and PhDs, no matter what type of field of therapy studied.  At first, I was pretty disheartened, even a little pissed-off.  After all, I was spending 10 years of my life gaining the wisdom to help others. 

Then I realized, it in not the theories, the techniques, or the letters behind my name that help others in their path through life;  It is the willingness to walk my own path, feel my own pain, and joy, that helps me sit with others.  I learned (and am learning) to be with myself, whatever I am experiencing, so I can be with others, so they are not alone. 

These wise words from Jeff Brown www.lifewithoutacentre.com reminded me of what I began to get a glimmer of in grad school.


BUDDHAS NEXT DOOR

Some of the greatest therapists and healers I've ever known have no diplomas, no qualifications, no letters after their names. They have written no books, and you won't find them being interviewed on TV chat shows. But they are so effortlessly compassionate, able to listen deeply without prejudice, willing to hold the most intense energies in their unshakeable presence. With their loving attention, the unacceptable can move into a space of acceptance, traumatic material can re-emerge without shame, the darkness can come into the light, be felt fully and integrated in a space of safety and kinship, without fear. They are as comfortable with silence as they are with the most heart-breaking personal stories. There is no sense of "I am the expert with all the answers", no image of themselves as the great saviours of mankind or enlightened gurus. These unknown, undiscovered Buddhas are the therapists and teachers of the future, humanity's hope, and they may not even know it. 

- Jeff Foster

The Deep Strength of Listening

Sitting with others when they are in pain, when there is nothing to be done except give them love, can sometimes feel overwhelming.  I am getting a deeper understanding of the strength it takes to hold one's center and allow another to feel, and know their self better.  Bless the parents, teachers, therapists, and friends who can hold this space.  It is a gift, and it is powerful. 

So much uncertainty...

I recently saw the post below on Facebook.  It was written by Melanya Helene from  www.thebrooklynbay.org.

Her words are powerful, and speak to why I do this work.

So much uncertainty...

"Sometimes life gives us more uncertainty than we feel we can handle. It takes a lot of confidence to keep going forward with our lives in the face of so much unknown.

I used to think of confidence as a knowing-what-to-do. The feeling that you can't go wrong and things will go your way...

I guess I'd like to feel that way. But more often I don't know what to do. It's hard to make decisions. I can see pretty clearly how things could go wrong and the very real possibility that I will not get what I want.

How do I move forward and not get stopped by doubt and fear?

I've been contemplating a different definition of confidence. Something like this:

Confidence in my own ability to meet whatever happens. Confidence in keeping my mind open and flexible and creative. Confidence that I can stay with difficult feelings and situations and emerge stronger and wiser.

The problem is that when I'm scared or feel thwarted - I lose this ability to stay open and curious. I get caught in protective mode and can only see a few options - and they are primal ones - push through, lash out, hide, get away...

When this happens (and it can happen surprisingly often when you start paying attention) you literally lose access to some really important parts of your brain (prefrontal cortex for starts). When fear triggers us, we lose the part of us that is flexible, creative, caring… and your options get very limited.

We live much of our lives trying to avoid situations that scare us. We will do almost anything to stay away from certain feelings of fear and shame - that feeling of no-good-option.
 

This limits our lives. There are many things we can't try, directions we can't explore, risks we can't take - if we have to stay away from certain intolerable feelings.

There is another way

When we gently get to know our fear and shame - not to push past it or shove it aside - but really get to know these feelings and care about them, we start to be far less run by them. They become known to us, like old friends, and we can bring them with us as we move forward in our lives.

We all have certain feelings that seem intolerable. And these feelings shape our lives. But what makes them intolerable is not so much the feelings themselves, but the experience of being alone with those feelings.

Because we have always been alone with certain feelings.

When we receive care in these untouchable places... when we have the experience that someone is with us - really there - while we feel what seems intolerable, it gives us an amazing resiliency.

This kind of support leads to a kind of confidence that you will be okay when things don't go 'well'.

It lets you take risks and live your life fully.

Pretty powerful stuff."
 

Warmly, Melanya

Compassion is not a relationship between the healer and the wounded; It is a covenant between equals.

From "The Tatooed Heart" by Gregory Boyle

This, for me, is what therapy, and life, are all about.


"Connection is the energy that is created between people when they feel seen, heard, and valued; when they can give and receive without judgment.

Belonging is the innate human desire to be part of something larger than us. Because this yearning is so primal, we often try to acquire it by fitting in and by seeking approval, which are not only hollow substitutes for belonging, but often barriers to it. Because our true belonging only happens when we present our authentic, imperfect selves to the world, our sense of belonging can never be greater than our level of self-acceptance."

from Brene Brown, Daring Greatly

You Must Not Hide Your Power

No, you must not hide your power
Nor stuff it in a shell of smallness
in some attempt at bland conformity;
Must not succumb to thoughts that say
To cloak your power
would make you more like others,
More acceptable, more lovable,
Deserving of more care —
That, to fit in, you must be small like them.

No one is small!
And you must not be fooled
by shells that make them seem so
or games that shells may seem to play.

If you stand up
And breathe into the depth
of your own power
You will awaken
a rush of recognition
And hear the ripping
of all the shells of smallness
Cracking open, falling off from all the others
Who each have found their power
And now step free.

©Wendy Mulhern
February 17, 2013

The journey toward our beauty is a magnificent struggle.

Achieving an integrity between what we believe and how we live is a challenge worthy of the gift of life.

A thousand obstacles stand between our selves and the honoring of our truth. ...

A thousand distractions. ...A thousand ego-generated delusions.

To dive down, find the beauty, nurture it and offer it to the world is magnificent.

Staying with your beauty, your truth, your integrity is difficult,
but out of these things comes meaning, and meaning is all-transcendent.

~Rod MacIver

A lovely poem from a wise friend of mine. May we all know the truth of these words.


Resolutions

As Cassandra knew,
Seeing someone’s future
is no more useful
than seeing someone’s problem —
You can’t tell them about it
Can’t get them to believe, or to reform

It shouldn’t be surprising —
No one else is different from ourselves
And we have always found
these resolutions to reform
to be contrary escalators
Plunging downward
much more rapidly
than we can rise.

Close your eyes
The winter sun that sparkles on the water
Still flickers, strobe-like, underneath your lids
The light still loves you,
Still knows how to touch
each dream that you, from fear of failure, hid
Your truth still owns you, and it knows
how every part of you is put together
Already worthy, cherished, ever whole
Not needing harsh reform to make you better
No need to reinvent yourself, no way to fall
And as it is with us
it is with all.

©Wendy Mulhern
January 1, 2013

"Do not fight against pain; do not fight against irritation or jealousy. Embrace them with great tenderness, as though you were embracing a little baby. Your anger is yourself, and you should not be violent toward it. The same thing goes for all of your emotions." ~Thich Nhat Hanh

Unconditional Love is so unconditional that it even embraces our failure to Love unconditionally. ~Audrey Lou Chambers

"Problems", big or small, are opportunities to make a change. It is fascinating how we keep getting presented with the same problems, again and again, until we make the choice to change.

Thank you, dear one…

My beloved cat, Coda, died last year. While I experienced great sorrow, his death (as did his life) has given me great gifts.

Coda came into my life 14 years ago, during one of the most difficult times of my life. He was a constant loving companion. I could always count on his presence to bring me comfort, or to simply increase the joy I was already feeling.

I was scared about how I would handle his death, and it turned out to be mind-blowingly painful. Yet in letting myself feel the pain, without trying to stifle it, or to judge myself for it, I received profound gifts.

People came out of the woodwork to do what they could to ease my pain. It is not easy to see someone you love in such grief. Yet they offered to walk with me a little to give what comfort they could. Bless their souls.

I realized that the pain in my heart I felt because of my cat’s passing, was simply the loss of being able to love him. The love we feel for any person or creature we have lost is OUR love, and cannot be taken away. That love is ours, and we can choose to give it to ourselves.

I truly believe when our hearts are broken wide open by a loss, we can let love, including our own, in deeper. Quite a gift indeed.

Even in death, Coda continues to open my heart. Thank you my furry little buddy, from the depths of my soul.

Thought for the day...

How can we attempt wondrous things if we don't allow ourselves to fail?