Home Care in Pittsburgh: Avoid Social Isolation with Home Care and Other Options
Social isolation can be a sign of deepening depression for your aging adult. She might start to withdraw from the people and the activities that she loves for a variety of reasons, but you can help her to reach out again.
Look for the Signs of Social Isolation
Signs of social isolation can vary from one person to another, but what you're looking for is a general withdrawal from regular activities and events. Your senior may simply no longer express interest in those activities or in being around people. She might seem less motivated, have less energy, and seem to display self-worth issues. She may seem to be extremely sad or you might just feel as if something is a little bit off.
Keep Your Senior Involved
Keeping your elderly family member as involved as possible with her regular activities can do quite a bit to help her to avoid social isolation. When she needs a break, that's one thing, but your senior shouldn't remove herself from all of her favorite activities.
Find New Ways to Share Companionship
Your senior may need help in other ways to stay socially active. If she's not able to drive herself any longer, she may need your help or the help of home care providers to get her where she wants to go. Or you may simply want to hire home care providers to spend a few hours a week with your senior. With a bit of creativity, you can work out a system that is perfect for your senior.
Look for New Activities She Might Enjoy
In some cases, your senior may not want to engage in some of the activities that she used to enjoy. This is when branching out and helping her to find new activities to love and to enjoy can really help. you might want to scope out the classes available at the local community college or even at different community centers.
Try Using Technology, Too
Technology has brought people closer together than they've ever been and that can be true for your senior, too. She might enjoy using video chatting to bring family members together who haven't been able to see each other in years. Look for all sorts of ways to use technology to help your senior reach out to others.
Ultimately, you can't make your senior be more social, of course. But you can provide as many opportunities as possible for her to have as much interaction with other people as she might desire.
Social isolation can be extremely dangerous for aging adults. The earlier you spot trouble the sooner you can do something about it.