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It’s always a difficult one when relatives don’t live just down the road. For some families, it might be a case of the family members living a few hours apart, and for others, countries apart.
The distance can also make it challenging when needing to provide hands-on care, responding to emergencies and monitoring their well-being as effectively as possible.
The realities that families face when ageing relatives live hours away can certainly be challenging and worrying. Here are some of those challenges that are typically faced when ageing relatives.
Emotional and psychological realities
There are a lot of emotional and psychological realities that are faced when a loved one who is a lot older lives hours away.
Guilt and helplessness
For a lot of caregivers who want to give help to their ageing loved ones, they’ll often struggle with feelings of guilt. Not being able to be with their loved ones physically to provide that assistance and support, as well as a feeling of helplessness and worry, is likely to feel overwhelming at times.
Emergency scenarios might often pop up in their head, too, which is normal and natural to experience when you’re not close by.
Anxiety and stress
There can often be a lot of stress and anxiety that comes with an ageing relative’s day-to-day well-being. Not only that, but their safety and potential health crises can often take a big toll on the caregiver’s mental and physical health.
Communication gaps and misunderstandings
Communication is perhaps one of the most challenging parts of trying to keep connected with ageing loved ones who live hours away. Ageing relatives may find themselves downplaying their health issues to avoid becoming a burden, and important details can often get lost in translation.
Clear communication and regular, honest updates are a good way of overcoming this barrier.
Family conflict
There can sometimes be tensions that arise amongst siblings or other local and distant caregivers, especially when divvying up responsibilities. It can also be a source of conflict when it comes to decision-making power and what‘s the perceived fairness of duties or responsibilities that each person should have.
Logistical and practical realities
Some logistical and practical realities often come to the forefront when dealing with ageing relatives who live a long distance away.
Difficulty in condition assessment
It’s often hard to get an accurate, day-to-day picture of a relative’s physical and emotional health. Subtle changes in condition or within their living environment might be missed as a result.
Care coordination challenges
Organising and coordinating local services like medical appointments, grocery deliveries, and home care can be hard to manage too, especially if across different time zones.
Emergency response
One of the major concerns that comes with ageing relatives living far away is the emergency response and how quickly the employee is when it comes to responding during a crisis. It’s why it’s helpful to have Canadian senior monitoring devices available for those who need them and for the caregivers to keep an eye on their loved ones from afar.
Financial realities
Finally, some financial realities are faced in the form of direct and indirect costs. For care-giving that requires the individual to travel to and from the loved one’s location, that can rack up some considerable expenses. From travel costs to professional care services, it all adds up.
While these are all challenges, long-distance caregivers can help themselves by leveraging technology, building local support networks and communicating with their ageing relatives regularly.
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