Tips For Helping Your Elderly Loved One Stay Motivated While In Short Term Rehab

If you are a person who has an elderly loved one who has fallen recently or suffered some sort of other injury, there is a good chance that he or she will need to go to short term rehab in order to fully recover. This can be frustrating for your loved one because he or she values his or her independence and having to go to rehab or getting injured in the first place might seem like an affront to this. Here are some tips for helping your loved one stay motivated while in short term rehab so that it is as effective as possible.

1. Do the Exercises With Your Loved One

One way to help your loved one stay motivated is to actually do the exercises with him or her to make sure that he or she is actually doing them. Doing the exercises while with the physical therapist is not enough. Your loved one needs to be performing the exercises while on his or her own or else they are not going to be nearly as effective and it will take your loved one longer to heal. If, whenever you visit your loved one, you ask to be shown how to do the exercises, you can make sure that he or she is actually getting in the practice time that he or she needs.

2. Create a Reward for Finishing Short Term Rehab

Another way to keep your loved one motivated is to offer a reward for finishing short term rehab. Maybe you take your loved one out to his or her favorite restaurant or to your child's recital or some other activity involving your child. Talk to your loved one to see what he or she would like to do. Try to choose an activity that will leverage the healing and strengthening that he or she is doing while in rehab. This will help keep your loved one motivated and willing to work to progress.

3. Emphasize Independence

Make sure that you emphasize the fact that your loved one is able to do fewer activities on his or her own while he or she is weakened from the injury. Talk about how great it will be when your loved one is able to do those activities again when he or she has gotten stronger. By emphasizing independence, you can help your loved one feel motivated to regain that independence as soon as possible.

For more information, talk to a company that specializes in short term rehab like Valley View Retirement Community.


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