Ideas for Encouragement

I've never dealt with having to encourage someone that age but I, myself, had to learn how to walk again. The best things people could have done/did do for me was understand that I was going to be slow and this was not going to be a short process. I used both a wheelchair and a walker throughout my therapies. Patience is a huge part of the healing and rehabilitation process. Please, always try to acknowledge her thoughts, complaints and emotions through all of this. Try to include her in typical activities that you normally would before the surgery. I can honestly say I detested whenever people treated me as through I wasn't there anymore because I couldn't walk. Use encouraging speech and actions constantly but don't feel as though you can't acknowledge the negativity surrounding this very tumultuous event.

Best wishes for you all.

My husband's grandmother had a hip replacement at 98. She is turning 101 in May and still cooks for herself every night. She has done amazingly well. She does use a walker though.

Good luck to your GM!

I'm so happy for you that she made it through the surgery. Most that age with a broken bone have such a hard time.

She's in pain and her body is going to be very tired. They'll have to be patient with her but still push her to do the work. Just help her remember some goal she can make.

That's great that she made it through! What a wonderful surgeon, and a wonderful grandma!

In addition to the ideas suggested, I would encourage you to speak with the social worker at the rehab facility, or wherever she is. Medical social workers have a lot of training in terms of working with geriatric populations, and as a rule they tend to be wonderful people.

My FIL (who's in his late 70s) had an injury this winter and was in rehab for a while. He had a very tough time at first, but the social workers were amazing, and they made a huge difference in his recovery.

My best wishes to your husband's grandmother!

Lots of contact, if you live nearby or if you don't! If you're close geographically, visit her every day if you can. If she's too far away, use e-mails, texts, snail mails, phone calls, or whatever works for her. Have your children send her notes and pictures, too.

If you can get to know Grandma's therapists, it will really help you learn how to encourage her. Years ago, I broke an ankle and had surgery. The rehab and therapy was wonderful for me, but I didn't always think so at the time. It was painful and exhausting! But that's part of the recovery process. If her body doesn't re-learn, she'll be stuck. You know what she needs to keep going at it, because you know what sort of person she is. (And so will the therapists.)

And Quiet Observer is right: Sometimes people will act as if you're invisible when you're injured. The first time I went to a store in a wheelchair, with a friend, the sales clerks always talked to her instead of to me. So when you get to take your grandmother out, warn her about that and defend her from it if you can. I had to do it by immediately speaking to the sales clerk - thus enabling the woman to realize that I was only in a cast and not comatose before she had a chance to wonder about it.

All you can do is show how much she has to look forward to by the fact that she made it through the surgery with flying colors. But at her age, she may not want to work as hard as they want her to. She may feel her days are limited, she may have memory/focus problems, she may just be tired - after all, she's 98. The rehab staff are generally pretty skilled at saying how well someone is doing. But I can tell you, since my own 92 year old relative just went through a broken shoulder, that being in rehab is scary to them because they see people who won't try or who won't get better. Rehab hurts right after surgery - the more than can do through the pain, the more range of motion they will get back. The longer they sit around, the worse it is. But this stuff HURTS! My 92 year old will never get back full range of motion because she only did what didn't hurt, and she ran out of stamina and motivation. You can't want it more for her than she wants it for herself.

Usually people do better with strangers so she might do better with therapists than with you. However, if members of the family can (with the grandma's permission) get instructions from the therapists and get properly trained (important!), then they can help Grandma do exercises in between therapy appointments. (They may come twice a day but want her to do things 4 times a day). So you can say, "Show me how they want you do to things, Grandma" or "would it help if I counted for you or steadied you as you get up?"

Helping can be as simple as counting the repetitions Grandma is supposed to do, or providing some assistance, or other things. But a) get trained and b) offer to help. DO NOT think it's okay for everyone in the family to hover and nag - that usually backfires.