Guest Post: “Moving a High Tech Dad to Assisted Living”
Note: This is a guest post from a colleague of mine, Harris Loeser, that I felt was an appropriate topic for my site but from a different angle that I have not really touched on: technology concerns for those in their golden years.
I just spent a long weekend moving my kids’ high tech Grandfather (my Dad)Â and low tech Grandmother (both 88 yrs old) from their condo of the last 15 years to an assisted living facility. In the course of this move, I re-learned one key lesson which made this move go relatively smoothly.
Allow me to explain that my Dad is not a technologist, but a lawyer and a gadget freak. So, he has three Macs, wireless, dynamic digital photo albums on the apartment walls, sets up his own Tivo, has his iPhone automatically synching with his Prius, and he knows the guys (and gals) at the Apple store by first name.
As most of you can imagine, moving house at 88 is fairly traumatic for many reasons, not the least being the disruption in carefully remembered locations of everyday items, both digital and physical.
In this case, we hired a “life transition” consultant who arranged the move and all the details of cutting their household belongings in half. This was done highly competently and with almost no glitches.
The most impressive and important part of the consultant’s role was that while my parents were biding their time for two days in a hotel, the consultant packed up, brought in movers and unpacked at the new assisted living apartment and put many familiar items exactly as they had been arranged in the vacated apartment. My Mom’s collection of teapots was placed (carefully) in the same order on the same pieces of shelf furniture, the familiar silverware was ready to use in a drawer in the kitchen and the heirloom clocks were ready to be wound and start their reassuring ticking.
And my Dad’s primary desktop Mac was in the same position on his same desk with the printer in exactly the same reaching distance of his left hand. Comcast had already been through and done their thing at the prodding of the consultant. All Dad had to do was sit down in his familiar chair and boot up.
While the first days in the new place still involved a lot of learning new neighbors, stress around laptop power supplies left at the hotel, and where to shop and see the doctor, the familiar stuff was invaluable in making them feel like they were in their comfortable home and not just visitors. The socks and underwear readily at hand in the same drawer in the same bureau made a huge difference in keeping down confusion and frustration. While there is still a lot to be done and remembered it is surmountable. There were no boxes to unload, or to have to reach into looking for the iPhone charger or the can opener.
The lesson I learned is that if there is any way you can arrange for your high tech Dad to move into a familiar physical and digital environment with his wireless cloud already up and running and without him having to unpack and make a lot of decisions, it goes a long way to cutting down the normal 3 to 6 month getting adjusted period.
The life transition consultant we used (in the Boston Area) is Stephanie Berk. She is not inexpensive, but in our case with myself and siblings all more than 1000 miles away, worth every penny. Stephanie comes highly recommended by this writer.
Practical problem solving for complex family transitions
email: stephanie AT stephanieberk.com
phone: 617 497.8844 office
http://www.stephanieberk.com
I often take technology for granted and my own family sometimes takes me any my technology addictions for granted as well, assuming that any tech in the household will work and if it breaks it will immediately be fixed or replaced. However, people 
should remember that technology is not “easy” for everyone. I often forget this as I become frustrated with my own parents understanding (or lack there of) when it comes to anything with a power cord. The example of the service that Harris writes about is an important one and the concept one that is frequently overlooked. The “older generation” is a lot more tech-savvy than we really know and becoming more so as years progress and as technology becomes even more accessible.
Unfortunately, it doesn’t mean that technology become easier. Quite the contrary. There are more options now available with different types of gadgets that do similar things and what this translates to is more confusion, even to those who are younger and less “set in their ways.” The best path to take is the one that you are comfortable with and that the person who you are helping understands. Also, each individual is different: my father doesn’t like change when it comes to his technology, yet he does occasionally try new things (he has an iPhone for example). My mother has trouble with some basic concepts, but she takes classes to learn and also now does all of her professional art photography entirely digitally. My step-mom dives in with both feet sometimes without looking back and likes trying new things, even if I am forced to undo things later.
The lesson to be learned here is to work with the individual, young or old, and figure out what they are comfortable with. The environment is a critical aspect to all of this, as Harris points out, but if this environment is carefully set up, what happens therein can be magic in the hands of the do-er.
HTD Says: It’s important to respect your elders and their desire to be “techy” if they want to. If that’s the path they choose, ensure that their environment is familiar and comfortable and help them down that path to your best ability.
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andrea
