Caring for an elderly family member losing their memory presents challenges. They are suddenly in a world where they realize they can’t trust what their brain is telling them.
For the many years they lived, they trusted the information and memories their brain brought to their awareness. With the memory difficulties, they now face a world where they can’t trust what their own brain is telling them.
Not trusting your own brain makes for a scary experience. It leaves you unsure regarding your past, your evaluation of what is going on and your ability to make decisions. Communicating with them requires frequent redirects and accuracy checks.
If this is your first time or first rodeo as we say in Texas, it’s unnerving. Your mind suddenly makes shifts and adjustments in staying connected with the person your caring for. All those adjustments and redirects require conscious effort.
Once you’ve been through it, you know what to do along with what to look for. The memory problems of caring for the elderly also has an important lesson for those of you recovering from an affair.
What the cheater doesn’t realize is that the affair changed their thinking. It changes the way they process information along with their understanding of things. They are so used to bending reality to meet their needs, they don’t see the change.
What this means is that the cheater can’t trust the information their brain is telling them. Their brain is so used to being ‘turned on’ it twists and distorts input. Their brain has been warped by the affair and they don’t realize it.
Dealing with this ‘warping’ involves them double-checking what you tell them. They need to make sure they understand what you are asking them or telling them. It’s not a matter of treating them like a child, its a matter of resetting their brain functioning. They need a way of resetting their brain back to where they can trust what it’s telling them without distortion.
If you don’t have a relapse prevention plan you’re asking for trouble and don’t know it. If your relapse prevention plan doesn’t include some type of accuracy check in resetting their brain, you’re missing an important piece of getting your spouse back.
Getting them back physically is only the beginning. Getting their thinking back requires resetting their brain with techniques like accuracy checks on making sure their understanding things.
The video “Preventing Affair Relapse” deals with the challenges of getting your spouse back along with ways of reducing the dangers along the way. Affair Relapse takes more than just saying ‘no’.
Best Regards,
Jeff
