While aging is inevitable, everyone looks forward to advancing in age. However, some of the things you did without challenges become more difficult as you age. Some things will even become completely impossible and you stop them. It is, however, important that you remain active and engaged even in your advanced years. For some seniors, however, they are no longer motivated about staying active.
For aging individuals, being inactive could be a source of more health challenges. Such health problems will affect their independence as well. You should motivate your senior loved to stay engaged and exercise regularly. It might be a huge task trying to motivate aging loved to remain engaged since most of them don’t see the need of being active. Influencing seniors to remain active is also difficult because of the many health problems that affect them.
However, it is important that you remain positive, kind, and patient when trying to motivate an aging person to stay active. In case the aging loved one stay active from an early stage, there will be more health benefits. An active senior person will translate into a healthy aging person. The active senior will also be happy. The main challenge, however, is convincing you aging loved one to remain active and engaged.
If you have an aging loved one who is reluctant about being engaged or active, giving up will not be an option. But even when your aging loved one doesn’t want to be active, you should not give up. As you try encouraging them to be active, try to show them what benefits are there in being active. Again, educate them on the need to ensure they are mentally and physically active in their life. For instance, physical activity helps aging individuals become more flexible, reduce fall risk, build strength and reduce anxiety and depression.
There are, however, certain tips that would help keep your senior loved more active. Such tips will include the following.
1. Show them how to video call and chat.
It is likely that your senior loved one will have challenges utilizing technology to talk and chat with friends and family. Teaching them to use some of the technology will not be a hard thing. Also, set up some time for family members to call and chat with the senior loved one. When the aging loved become more comfortable about the idea of chatting with the family, it will also become easier to chat with friends.
2. Find some hobbies.
When looking for something that your loved one might enjoy, consider the things they used to do during their free time. You can then try to adapt the same thing for current challenges. If your loved one like reading magazine, you can provide magnifying glasses.