Tag: #reconnectlivemovement

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“Don’t talk me out of my feelings”~Ethel Anne Roome-Certified Grief Recovery Specialist

Dealing with the loss of a loved one during COVID19

Consider Creating A Second-Best Funeral

Condolences and how to comfort others

Lack of traditional support

Ways to create the 2nd best way to comfort yourself AND honor your loved one

Virtual support or support by mail

How can we lean on others, so many are afraid of grief

Condolences Focusing on positivity- Ethel Anne’s take on this

Do hobbies help and how do we determine what benefits us

Favorite ice cream: vanilla with caramel sauce

Song that reminds Ethel-Anne of her youth and why: The Stroll, American Bandstand with her dad

Leisure time: Flower Arranging

Book mentioned: Feelings Buried Alive Never Die, by Karol Kuhn Truman

Ethel-Anne Roome
Certified Grief Recovery® Specialist

Phone: 203-262-8326
Email: earoome@gmail.com

www.GriefRecoveryStartsHere.com 

Go to the Grief Recovery Institute website for more information on funerals and other grief topics.

DeClutter By Deirdre

To get in touch with me write to DeClutterByDeirdre@gmail.com

Thank you for listening, I appreciate YOU!!

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My guest today is Stephanie Dalfonzo who has spent more than 20 years researching holistic, natural, and scientifically proven ways to more than just manage stress and anxiety but build emotional resilience and truly break free from its vice-like grip. Stephanie is the author of  Goodbye Anxiety, Hello Freedom: How to Build Resilience and Overcome Anxiety I thought it was important to speak with her now that stress and anxiety have a tight grip on a lot of us. 

“When listening to someone, ask what’s going right, right now?” ~Author Stephanie Dalfonzo

Stephanie Dalfonzo- Holistic, Natural Assistance for Anxiety Tips from today:

  • Statistic- Prescriptions for anti-anxiety have increased by 34.1 percent in February 2020
  • One size anxiety relief does not fit all
  • Simple works
  • It’s a practice; never too late to start reducing anxiety
  • Know that you can get past this- it’s a rough spot
  • When listening to someone, ask what’s going right, right now?
  • Don’t create your own PTSD
  • High power, two-minute pose- body language impact
  • Smiling creates happy hormones
  • Rest, digest and relax

Favorite ice cream: mint chocolate chip and butter brickle

Song that reminds you of your youth and why: Got to be Real

Her book is Goodbye Anxiety, Hello Freedom: How to Build Resilience and Overcome Anxiety found on Amazon.com  https://www.amazon.com/Goodbye-Anxiety-Hello-Freedom-Resilience/dp/0999887009/ref=sr_1_1?crid=2HJCQTADA1KD3&dchild=1&keywords=goodbye+anxiety+hello+freedom&qid=1594661766&sprefix=goodbye+anxiety%2Caps%2C195&sr=8-1

To contact Stephanie Dalfonzo:  sd@StephanieDalfonzo.com

To get in touch with Deirdre at DeClutter By Deirdre, you can email me at declutterbydeirdre@gmail.com

Thank you for listening, I appreciate you!

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My guest today is Cynthia Perthuis who leads and owns the Senior Care Authority offices in New York City and Southwest Florida. Cynthia has a passion for helping others and advocating for those that do not have the ability to speak for themselves. Her own personal experience with her parents and her entrepreneurial background has helped so many family members with the stress of helping and caring for aging loved ones. 

I thought today we could chat about “The Talk”.  The Talk is having a discussion with a loved one about being alone in their home is no longer an option, it isn’t safe.

Are you trying to help someone who needs more care to make the decision to move out of their home? 

Helping an older person choose to move from their home to assisted living is never easy. She answers:

         What are the steps to having The Talk

             What are the ways to have The Talk

             Who should have The Talk

             What are some things to watch out for

Cynthia is an advocate, providing guidance on elders staying at home, or seeking assisted living options, here are some of her suggestions:

  • The talk with a parent/parents may require more than one conversation
  • Baggage regarding the conversation- might be fear, other factors
  • Begin the talk with pen and paper; record what you’re thinking
  • Identify the players, before the talk- may include siblings, Attorney- they all need to be on the same page with the person impacted by the decision to move or stay in place
  • Identify any challenges- financial, misinformation
  • Teachable moments- 911 calls, for example
  • Selfless phrases- it is about the person and not whoever begins the discussions
  • Choose the correct time for the talk
  • In-person tours of locations/virtual tours, and stipulate what is offered- trips, activities, food on offer

Favorite ice cream:  Halo Top mint chocolate chip

The song that reminds you of your youth:  Boys of Summer

Leisure time activity:  Cynthia has recently discovered pickleball, yoga

Connect to Cynthia at www.scanyfl.com  cynthia@seniorcareauthority.com

You can connect with me at declutterbydeirdre@gmail.com  or listen to the Magnificent Aging Podcast.

Thank you for listening I appreciate you.

You’re moving.  And, you’re moving far from your comfortable 5-mile radius.  In that 5-mile (or less) radius is your grocery store and you know exactly where they keep the brand of ice cream you love.

Your pharmacy where the pharmacist knows all your ailments for the past 20 years and which medicines work best for your ailment.

Your house of worship, why that religious leader knows what you’ve been through as your children we entering young adulthood.

Your mechanic, the one you trust to fix your car, just by listening to it, the proper way and not overcharge you.

Your favorite meeting spot where, as soon as you walk in the door, they are preparing your favorite drink for you without asking.

And your friends, the people you call when you need a ride, someone to chat with, someone to come over and decide which color you should paint the walls to go with your new furniture.

All of a sudden it hits you, you will be without your support system.

Where will you shop?

Where will you meet up with friends?

Where will you find friends?

Holy cow, that can be very scary!

Guess what?  You can fulfill all of these needs at your new home with deliberate social connections.  Get out of the house and start creating new social connections the first day!

Make it your mission to immediately find a new coffee shop that brings a smile to your face when you walk in.

Seek out a grocery store with exceptional service.

Drive by a couple of auto mechanic workshops and have a little chat.

Join a club where you can pursue social connections.

Finally, ReConnect Live with friends and neighbors from your former home, call them.

Moving changes an address, not a relationship.

Sign up for my newsletter.

I came across this snakeskin during a DeClutter session the other day and I wondered where he is now, is he behind the next box, has he already left the garage?  It made me think of the reason he was there in the first place, he probably was looking for his next meal and followed the scent of a mouse.  We find so many mice in basements and attics!

Then I started thinking about how we should all protect ourselves while DeCluttering from sharp objects, rodents, snakes, toxins, allergens, heavy items…and possessions we never want our friends and family to see.  These items can take the form of hidden bottles of alcohol (empty or full) or stashes of drugs or their paraphernalia.  Items such as these might not represent who we are NOW or who we are attempting to be in the future but there they are, still present in our home, like a weight around our necks.

Now is the time to DeClutter items that no longer have meaning to you but might be hurtful if your children or loved ones found them.  We have had children uncover their mother’s engagement announcement to a man besides their dad that was posted in the paper, they had no idea their mother was engaged before being married to their father.  Their parents were a long time, loving couple, they had never thought of the possibility that their mom had been in love with someone before their father.  It was shocking and I’m sure their mother had no idea of the pain that clipping would cause 60 years later.  Seemingly, it was saved in the moment and forgotten in the pile of memorabilia and hurt of the breakup.  But, here it was, being uncovered by those she would have protected from this knowledge at all costs.

Look at your possessions, especially the hidden ones, ask for help clearing emotional-producing items out of your life if you cannot do it alone or leave the premise and let someone else clear them out for you if they still hold a lot of power and emotion over you.  Contact DeClutter By Deirdre for help with these emotionally charged DeCluttering Sessions. You can do tough things! I believe in you!

Great Grandma’s China
One of the most angst producing items to get rid of in a home is the family’s set of china. The most expensive bone china was almost a given on all bridal registries and part of the wedding experience was planning a day to meet at the bridal registry at a favorite department store. Now, it stays stacked in piles in a breakfront or on shelves in the basement or packed away in a storage unit.
The sad thing is, right now not many people are interested in grandma’s china therefore it’s very hard to sell china. Unfortunately, those expensive, beautiful pieces of artwork that someone used to crave to be added to their wedding gift registry are out of style. Think of all the familiar manufacturers of china: Noritake, Lenox, Royal Dalton and Mikasa to name a few. There are also grades of china: fine bone china, porcelain, ceramic and earthenware/stoneware.
I suggest getting rid of the heavy dinnerware and use the bone china! Bone china is very durable and tends not to chip like other forms of dinnerware. China is lightweight and easier to handle as we get older. It’s thin and a lot of plates can be stacked in one cabinet.
Speaking of a lot of plates, think about how many you actually need. If you no longer host all the family dinner parties why not keep only the amount that you need for 6 days of meals? Keeping only 6 sets of dinnerware also allows for visiting company.
Try to find an organization who could use the extra dinnerware, think outside the box, ask around to different organizations, you will be surprised which organizations will take them.
Use the fine china, you deserve it!

I want you to understand the gravity of how quickly your situation can change. This is such an important concept that I am writing about it again, 2 years after my first post on the subject of personal control over your items and the importance of DeCluttering while you are still in charge of your faculties and your life.

Mary and Bill were living in their colonial home in a remote section of their town. Living with them were their Certified Nursing Assistants (CNA) and their wheelchair accessible van that they needed to get around town.  Their daughter lived 2 hours away and was bedridden, pregnant with her first child.

Colonials traditionally have a small half bath on the first floor and a steep staircase to get to the bedrooms and larger, full-size bathrooms. Mary was in a wheelchair because of some difficulty walking and it had been determined that she should go to a rehabilitation facility to gain back some physical strength.  At the same time, her husband Bill was moved to a different facility in a different town in order for him to regain strength lost after an illness.  They were both headed towards release from their perspective rehabilitation facilities and they decided it was time to move to a permanent home in an assisted living center which would entail moving to a third location.  Mary called me to see if we could facilitate that move to that third facility and coordinate with their CNA’s.

We set up a meeting so I could I meet with the 2 CNA’s to understand what Mary and Bill would need.  Mary had told me over the phone items she would need in their now very small one-bedroom apartment at their new home, but all other decisions were up to the CNA’s and they went back and forth as to which items should be taken to the new place.  They tried their best and I waited patiently for them to decide.

An issue came up while we were trying to get their possessions moved: I couldn’t get in contact with their head CNA, phone calls were made by me but never returned to me until a family member let me know that the CNA had been admitted to the hospital themselves!!  When we went to move the items that had been chosen we were told some of them were staying at the house and some new items were being taken to the new place.  We got the new items loaded up, unloaded at the new home and I set up their apartment in anticipation of Mary and Bill’s arrival the next day which was Thursday.  Friday, I got a call that Bill had died.

Months later I was giving a DeCluttering presentation at Mary’s new home and Mary attended. She wanted others to know what she had been through on her journey to her new one-bedroom home and recounted her story to all in attendance.  She wanted everyone to know she had zero say in what was taken to her new home, her nurse companion made those decisions for her and Bill and neither of them ever returned to their former home.  Mary said to listen to Deirdre, get rid of items while you are in charge.

I hope you will heed what Mary said and contact me if you need help onsite or from a distance.  www.DeClutterByDeirdre.com

Why haven’t you DeCluttered (even though you want to)?

You want to DeClutter but it seems like an overwhelming prospect to you. Websites are filled with images of rows and rows of matchy-matchy clear plastic containers with the perfect script or block lettering labels on them or, there are rows of color-coordinated cloth bins to separate like items. You think I want that! I want my closets and pantries to look like that. Excitedly you start dreaming of how your closet and/or pantry will look once it’s completely organized.

First, there are some decisions to make. Matching clear plastic bins and clear labels with black lettering or white labels with your favorite color lettering. Maybe you want the cloth, colorful bins. Do the containers you choose have lids, do you need lids or do containers without lids work better for your life? First, you must buy the matching clear plastic containers, where do you go for the “best” ones? Oh boy, now you must purchase a label maker. Hhhhmmm, do you choose the clear labels or the white labels?

This type of organizing, unless you’re a professional, is exhausting even before you begin! Decide for yourself which type of organizing will work best with your life. If decision making around bins and label makers and labels stop you in your DeCluttering tracks maybe you don’t need that level of organization right now. Maybe that’s something to be done in the future after you’ve DeCluttered.

Right now, reduce your stress. Look at what you want to accomplish utilizing baby steps. Don’t go buy hundreds of dollars of supplies, that adds pressure as well. Do what you can with what you have and in the future put together a fabulous labeled space.  If you need help, contact me. We can DeClutter your space utilizing Distance DeClutter By Deirdre where I will walk you through the process. I know how to support you and take away the overwhelm, contact me. DeClutterByDeirdre@gmail.com.

A few years back Hurricane Charley hit our then home and we had to get rid of most the contents, somehow our photographs, my parent’s former dining room set, and our important papers were spared because of where they were located in our home.  They were in the dining room of the home behind a little wall that had, thanks to the storm, one of my neighbor’s roof tiles embedded into it at head height.

Luckily, because this was a new-to-us home and we were planning on a remodel we had taken lots of photos of the current contents and we had photos of the contents already in boxes that were to be used once the home was remodeled.   However, this is not the way I would have chosen to DeClutter.

Recently, we had a trailer stolen out of a storage facility.  The thief cut the lock on the gate to the facility then cut the lock on our new trailer.  We had sold a home and placed everything we still wanted in the trailer awaiting the purchase of a new home.  Included in that trailer were family heirlooms that I was holding until family members could all gather together, and we could distribute the heirlooms to their new owners.  It also included items I had been given through inheritance that would be perfect for our new home, tools, painted family portraits, an entire kitchen set up, all my winter clothing and all sorts of treasures I hoped would grace our new home.   Again, not a good way to DeClutter!

Both times I felt an incredible sense of loss for different reasons.  The first time I was overwhelmed by the devastation and amount of work involved in repairing and replacing all that was lost and damaged. The good news is I had lots of photos of the contents of the home for insurance reimbursement.

The second time was more emotional because of the loss of family heirlooms and I hadn’t recorded everything in the trailer because some of it had just come into my possession.  And, I thought they would very soon be dispersed.  Every couple of days I recall another item I had in the stolen trailer.

My suggestion is to take lots of photos of items and if you can, keep receipts with the photos.  The insurance company wants to know you paid for an item to record it as a loss, of course.

My message is twofold: 1. Don’t wait to take care of something you need to do in the future, I thought I was being considerate and hoping to have a celebration to distribute the inherited items. I should have immediately taken photos and distributed them to all parties involved. 2. Keep good records including pictures of items separate from the items themselves, even if you expect something to be a quick turnaround. I suggest keeping photos in 2 separate locations.

It’s not the way I would have liked to DeClutter those items but it’s what happened.  On the bright side, it will be fun finding updated replacements for items that were lost and I’ll always have my memories.

A photo is worth a thousand words….

I was thinking the other day how lucky I am to have reconnected with former teachers who had a huge impact on my life.  I thought about the difference teachers can make on a person’s trajectory during their early years and how that impact is felt forever.

One of my favorites, Ms. Hagerty, introduced our class to her love of reading through acting out the voices for us as she read The Hobbit every day after lunch.  This practice decluttered our minds and got us ready to absorb the afternoon’s lessons.  It showed us the importance of reading every day, even for only a half hour and how that can transport you to another world. Many classmates have passed the love of reading on to their children through that book.

Ms. Hagerty also took us on field trips where experiential learning took place and made learning fun.  Everyone wanted to sit next to her, just to be in her presence and absorb whatever concept she was relating to us at the time. And, we tried out a new concept, an “Open Classroom” where we had classes on the school’s lawn, under a tree.  Exposure to new ways of teaching allowed us to understand how we best learn as individuals.

One of my classmates, Dina, remembers the Prisoner of War bracelets Ms. Hegarty introduced us to.  Prisoner of War bracelets http://thewall-usa.com/bracelet.asp  were created during the Viet Nam war as a reminder that soldiers were not forgotten.  On each POW/MIA bracelet was the name, rank and loss date of an American soldier. We purchased and wore them keeping an eye out for each soldier’s return to the United States so we could return the bracelet to the POW/MIA soldier so they understood they were never forgotten.  “POW bracelets taught us to be socially conscious, she didn’t treat us like 5th graders, she treated us like people who could make a difference in the world.”

Understanding that we all learn differently, she spoke about her vulnerability when she learns new things and passed on her tips and tricks to help us as unique individuals best learn in our own way.  She was so organized and had such well-planned lessons and outings we never felt confused by what we were going to be doing that day or what we were learning, she showed us how to organize and declutter our minds.

It was a very safe learning environment. What a gift our grammar school gave us by hiring her!  Imagine, a teacher being able to reach 40 unique students in a variety of ways, ways that worked while creating socially conscious people.   I cannot thank her enough!  Why not reach out to your positive former teachers?