Rick
Lauber knows a lot about caregiving for older people and much of that
knowledge is based on personal experience.
Lauber,
an Edmontonian, acted as caregiver for both his mother, who had Parkinson’s
disease and leukemia, and his father, an Alzheimer’s sufferer.
Since
then he has been attempting to help other caregivers by sharing what he learned
as a result of his experiences.
In
2010, Self-Counsel Press published his book the Caregiver's Guide for Canadians.
In
the book, Lauber describes his own caregiving experiences and provides
recommendations for other prospective, new and current caregivers (including
adult children, friends, spouses and/or partners).
“I
like to think that my book has been written from a very personal perspective,”
he has said. “There are other books on the market about caregiving and a number
of conditions, but a lot of them are written by professionals. So my book
offers a more everyday, anecdotal experience.”
The
book is intended to provide encouragement and support for caregivers, along with practical
advice on how to care for elders in need. It deals with issues such as balancing
caregiver responsibilities with personal life, applying for guardianship and/or
trusteeship hire a professional caregiver should the need arise and when a move to assisted
living is necessary.
The
Caregiver's Guide for Canadians
is available at Chapters bookstores, at Amazon.ca, and from the Self-Counsel
Press web site. The price is $17.95.
In addition to promoting
the book, Lauber also works to get his message about caregiving out through writing
articles, giving interviews, a blog and a twitter account, @cdncaregiver.
“I do see that more
resources are becoming available,” he remarked. “That’s a good thing. But I
think a lot of the resources are still difficult to connect with for family
caregivers. I’m not sure why, whether it’s a lack of advertising or a lack of
public knowledge, but it is unfortunate because the resources are there to
help.”
