Family Conflict
Family Dynamics
In our society, elder care and family conflict have become virtually synonymous. On elder care websites family conflict dominates the discussion groups. 40% of informal family caregivers report sibling rivalry and serious conflict with other family members. For some caregivers, the care of the elder is less challenging than the family conflict which can last and impact families long after the elder is gone.
Evidence suggests that elder abuse and neglect are extreme manifestations of family conflict.
We must provide resources and find a means to support family caregivers through a process of mediation or conflict resolution. One possibility is that our facilitators receive training in an appropriate conflict resolution process such as transformative mediation and have various tools and processes that can specifically identify the common dilemmas & dynamics that families face caring for an elder facing cognitive decline.
If facilitators are receive training it is posibility that family dynamics can become a topic in the Social Support Circles.
Undoubtedly denial is a powerful force in elder care, as is self-preservation - and also empathy. We must find a way to address these forces without turning each family member into an enemy.
Perhaps staff on the March of Dimes "Warm Line" can be trained to provide empathy, resources and direction.
Also, link to mediation services in the area - especially ones that are subsidized or free.
In addition, a possibility is that we start addressing those who are seeing the possibility of elder care on the horizon. It is clear that families that begin working together at this stage have much more success in caring for an elder.
We invite our partners to help us address this issue
"Strawbridge and Wallhagen (1991) reported that 40 of 100 adult offspring caregivers experienced serious conflict with other family members and that family conflict correlated significantly and positively with caregiver burden and poor reported health."
"Noteworthy are our findings concerning the linkages between characteristics of caregiving families and the provision of help. Families that use positive conflict resolution methods provide significantly more help than families that do not. Families that assign decision-making responsibilities to a single family member with at least some input from others provide more help than families that use more democratic but potentially more disorganized methods. Taken together, these findings suggest that the provision of family help is greatest when there is a family ethos of using effective methods for resolving conflicts among family members regarding caregiving and decisions about caregiving, and when the responsibilities for decision making are focused and concentrated on a single family member. "
Click here to READ FULL ARTICLE
The Effects of Family Conflict Resolution and Decision Making on the Provision of
Help for an Elder With Alzheimer's Disease
Morton A. Lieberman and Lawrence Fisher
This volume presents important findings on conflict and abuse in families of the aged. A valuable resource for those in sociology, psychology, gerontology, and social work as well as psychotherapists who work with the aged, the staff of elder abuse programs, adult protective service workers, and legislators. the authors provide a fresh, historically balanced, empirical and theoretical framework for the view that elder abuse and neglect is an extreme manifestation of family conflict.
