Four Tips for Feeding Your Senior

If your elderly family member needs help with eating, that might be a new experience for both of you. Often seniors with mobility difficulties or problems chewing and swallowing need a little extra help with food. This isn’t something that either of you need to be embarrassed about, it’s just a new experience that you’ll be sharing.

Select Foods Carefully

Elderly Care Kannapolis, NC: Four Tips for Feeding Your Senior

Keep in mind that the types of food that you choose can make a big difference when you’re the one feeding your senior. If she has trouble swallowing or chewing, foods that have a dry or crumbly texture can be difficult for her to eat, even with your help. There might be some specific foods that your senior finds easier to eat with your help than others. Experiment with a few different options to find the ones that work the best.

Don’t Make Feeding Your Senior a Huge Production
If you’re calling too much attention to the fact that you’re feeding your senior, that can be embarrassing for her, even if you’re the only two people there. Treat this just like any other activity and don’t make it a production. Talk to your elderly family member in between bites and check in with her about whether she’s getting full or whether she wants to try other foods on the plate. But leave the airplanes and the trains out of the experience.

Get Some Hands-on Help
It’s not automatically easy to feed another adult. In fact, you might find that you’re feeling incredibly awkward about the entire process. Elderly care providers can show you some tips and tricks that they’ve learned. You and your senior might even find that it’s less awkward to have elderly care providers helping her at meals instead of you.

Stick with it Because Practice Helps
One thing you don’t want to do is to give up just because feeding your senior has become awkward or uncomfortable. Make an appropriate joke to lighten the mood and let your senior know that you’re doing your best. This is something that really can get better with a little bit of practice, so stick with it.

Feeding your elderly family member is just one more way that you can help her with her daily needs. She needs to get the right nutrition and your help might be the best way for that to happen. Whatever your solution is, make sure that it’s the best one possible for your aging adult.

Excerpt: If you’re feeding your elderly family member, you might find that it sounds easier than it is.

If you or an aging loved one are considering Elderly Care in Kannapolis, NC contact the caring professionals at Tender Hearted Home Care today. Call us at (704) 207-0265.