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San Mateo, CA (PRWeb) November 28, 2006 -- For many families, what creates holiday stress is family – especially aging parents. Rather than framing the holiday family experience with aging parents as dread, aging and eldercare advisor Esther Koch has the prescription for those in need of holiday stress relief: “Personalize the joy of the season by creating your own Moments of Joy,” she says.
“Use the holidays to change the focus from all that you have to do for your aging parents to the joyful experiences you can celebrate with them”, Koch says. “Seek to make the ordinary extraordinary and the possibilities for Moments of Joy are limitless”, Koch emphasizes.
Koch suggests the following to rekindle or make new holiday traditions. “The results can be memorable,” she says.
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Buy the tree together or trim the tree together.
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Go to the mall to watch picture taking with Santa or have a family photo with Santa.
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Check out the shopping windows or teach your parents to shop online.
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Go to a lighting event or take a drive to see some outdoor Christmas decorations.
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Do anything, or everything, with grandchildren.
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Visit old family friends or visit the neighborhood of holidays past.
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Go to a choir concert or a sing-a-long Messiah.
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Attend a church service or a Christmas Eve midnight mass.
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Donate food or clothing to a food bank or homeless shelter.
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Go to or rent a holiday movie or watch a holiday TV special.
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Make some special holiday treat or buy one already made.
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Bring out the old photo albums or take plenty of pictures and print them up right away.
“Your holidays will be joyful if you intend them to be,” Koch says. “You may have to start with forgiveness – forgive your parents, forgive your siblings and forgive yourself – then you’re really on the road to celebration.” Koch continues, “Recognize your parent’s limits and your own; adjust commitments whenever necessary; and don’t forget to schedule time for yourself. Most of all, be in the moment and don’t take for granted that your parents will always be as physically and mentally able as they are now, wherever that might be on the continuum." Koch concludes, “May your life be filled with no regrets; may you see the extraordinary in the ordinary; and may someone be there to brighten your world as you age.”
You can read Esther Koch’s article on Moments of Joy with her mother, “Kiss the Joy as It Flies By”, at http://www.gsb.stanford.edu/news/bmag/sbsm0611/feature_koch.html (or on the preceding web page).
About Esther Koch
Esther Koch is an aging and eldercare advisor. Her firm, Encore Management, provides personal and corporate advisory services and seminars that assist Boomers with the range of issues associated with caring for aging parents and their own aging. Her media interviews and articles have appeared on television, radio and in print.
To learn more about Encore Management or Esther Koch’s prescription for holiday stress relief with aging parents, visit www.encoremgmt.com.
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