May is both Older Americans Month and National Aging Life Care Month. This presents a wonderful opportunity to reflect on the things I love about the work I do as a Care Manager, celebrating our profession in Aging Life Care, and the clients we serve.
In that spirit, here are some of the reasons I love what my Aging Wisdom colleagues, my professional colleagues, and I do for a living.
Work with amazing clients and their families
During my 19-plus years with Aging Wisdom, I’ve worked with over 1,000 families. I have learned something from each of them and still find myself thinking fondly about past clients, especially the ones I worked with over many years. Now I get to watch my team touch the lives of our clients and am filled with joy when I read the impact we are making in their lives. Our clients have lived such rich, full lives. Learning about the work they have done and the things that bring them joy and pride over their lifetimes makes us proud and honored to be with them on the last part of their journey.
Support the entire client system
As Aging Life Care Professionals, our client is the family system. This is a unique in that we not only support the older adult but the team around them. This ties in nicely with my background in mediation training and as a mental health counselor. Supporting aging family members often brings out conflict in families. Our role is to help unite families and find common ground. This is often the most challenging part of our work but can be the most gratifying. We often say, the older adults are the easy part of our job! It’s the families that provide job security!
Collaboration and teamwork
At Aging Wisdom, we work as a close-knit team with and on behalf of our clients. This allows us to easily jump in as needed for crises and unexpected
appointments. Our families benefit from our collective wisdom and experience. As Aging Life Care Professionals, we frequently collaborate with the client’s other important advisors: elder law attorney, financial advisor, doctors, assisted living community staff, and fiduciaries. I find working in teams inspiring and energizing, and our families benefit from this unified approach. Our professional association (Aging Life Care Association) is made up of colleagues around the country who also collaborate and share ideas, best practices, and resources. When families need an expert in another part of the country, we often know, personally, an Aging Life Care Professional in the other city, which is reassuring.
<What is Aging Life Care? a bite-size podcast>
Opportunity to continue learning
In this work, we will never know it all and I am grateful that I continue learning, even after doing this work for over two decades. New challenges regularly come our way and being able to problem-solve new situations keeps this work exciting. At this point in my career, the more complicated the situation, the more intrigued I am. I love to roll up my sleeves and see how we can bring calm to the chaos.
Life is never dull!
I don’t think an Aging Life Care Professional can ever say they are bored. The nature of our work keeps us on the go and our client families keep us on our toes. The work is diverse, fast paced, and crisis driven. Given that I am a person who struggles to sit still, this work is a perfect fit.
Non-conventional
In our field, most jobs/roles have boundaries and limitations to what can be done to help a client. As Aging Life Care Professionals, our role is often defined by “other duties as assigned!” If something is needed, we jump in and help. If it is something out of our scope, we can refer to other professionals we have met along the way. It is a “Yes, we can!” profession, which I love.
Multi-disciplinary
As Aging Life Care Professionals our work touches the fields of medicine, law, and finances. On occasion, we are called upon to interpret what doctors, attorneys, and financial planners have said to our clients, communicating this important information in a personal way that suddenly clicks for them. We advocate on their behalf and often refer to these other experts, learning from their work with our clients. I love this variety in our work and opportunity to be constantly learning.
Experts in aging
Given the demographics of aging and lifespan, Aging Life Care Professionals are uniquely positioned as leaders in the field of aging, lending our clinical, person-centered, holistic expertise to all sectors serving older adults and their families. We positively shape the future and the conversation on aging — a role we don’t take lightly. The expertise of Aging Life Care Professionals can be summarized into eight core knowledge areas:
- Health and Disability
- Financial
- Housing
- Families
- Local Resources
- Advocacy
- Legal
- Crisis intervention
Ability to make a difference
The most gratifying part of our work is the ability to make a difference in our client’s lives. Families often come to us in crisis and through our work together, the situation is calmed, families gain time in their lives, and peace of mind.
Families in conflict can find commonality and work together. We play a unique role at a very important time and through these relationships, we build connections that often continue beyond the life of the older adult.
We also get to work with clients over many years. Here at Aging Wisdom, we have supported one of our current clients for over 13 years. Recently, I heard from a former client, a daughter whose father passed away over five years ago. In her thoughtful email she stated, “how lucky we were, as a family, to have had your expert guidance in such a time of mixed blessings.” I am the lucky one.
This month I am filled with gratitude for the honor to work with our Aging Wisdom clients and to make a small difference in their lives. And I am equally as filled with gratitude for the honor of being able to work with my Aging Wisdom colleagues as well as member colleagues at the Aging Life Care Association.
Could you benefit from the expertise of an Aging Life Care Professional? If you live in the greater Seattle-Bellevue area, schedule a free, get acquainted call to determine together whether our services are a good fit for your needs.
Lisa Mayfield founded Aging Wisdom® in 2003. She is a Past President Aging Life Care Association and is a licensed mental health counselor, geriatric mental health specialist, and certified care manager. Lisa brings over two decades of experience supporting and finding hope for families impacted by Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias. She is a trained mediator and helps families find common ground when they might not agree on the best approach to supporting their aging parents. Lisa also has a passion for helping baby boomers navigate unexpected health changes and proactively plan for their future.
