Citation
"Conscious Aging: Empowering Strategies for Working with Elders"
Therapist Vanessa Jackson, Produced by Microtraining Associates (Alexandria,
... [Show More] VA: Microtraining
Associates, 2017), 40 minutes
0:10
VANESSA JACKSON Hi, I am Vanessa Jackson, I'm a therapist in private practice in Atlanta, Georgia, and
the co-editor of a new book "Understanding Power:A Human Services Imperative." And today, I'm gonna
talk to you about working with elders, and the way I think about it, is conscious aging and sacred elderhood. I think a lot of therapists when they think about working with people post 50 and certainly people
in their '70s, '80s. We think about it as time of decline or a sadness and just loss. And as I start to
understand working and have the experience in working with elders is it's a time of a lot of vibrant
possibilities, it is a time of reflection, it's a time of letting uh… go, it's a time of thinking about the future
and thinking about death and dying but there's so much uh… rich and textured understand that could
happen in a clinical practice. And I think it's really important for all of us who work with adult
populations to be able to be present and to provide opportunities for people to reflect on what their
past has been, and to think about new possibilities, and things that are important uh… for them, and I
believe in a legacy, oftentimes, when I'm talking to elders, it's a lot about uh… how is my life unfolded
and if there are pieces that are still uh… to be uh… to unfold or to be experience like how do I help you
do that? And how can therapy be a part of that process of building a legacy of grieving maybe aspects to
yourself that didn't come to be your have been lost but to be able to sit umm… with people and, and talk
with them and help them to understand that. And so when it's been a gift for me in working with uh…
elders in my practice, for us to have conversations, especially, the really exciting part is when people start
to see possibilities that they thought or maybe lost to them. And uh… so it becomes a, really… for me, an
exciting part of it uh… as well as sitting with people around umm… the loss of parents and uh… how to
be conscious even in that grieving and oftentimes that makes people think about their own mortality.
And so how we can bring that into the consulting room in ways that gave people more choice to be
thoughtful about how this is gonna unfold for them. Umm… and so I want to be able to share some of
the work that I've done with my clients uh… with other therapist and, and certainly to invite people to
think about the unique ways that they engage elders in their own practices 'cause I think it's a time in
this third chapter of their life, third, maybe fourth chapter of their life. Umm… for a new understandings
and an exchange of wisdom uh… but also are freeing when people are no longer tied to roles of
parenting uh… maybe they have their own parents of transition and so there is both sadness but
freedom. Uh…and so for me, it's like being able to help people think about, how do you wanna be with
this time? And, and one of the things that I've done in that will… and that I use in my practice with
people are set a card that I've created on Sacred Elderhood that are… it's a tool that I use with people so
that they can maybe think about things, and think about this as a really expansive time in their life. Uh…
and so I have people draw all these cards and there are questions on the cards that allow them to
process things that might not come up normally… Uh… you almost have to and be, and sort of be invited
into certain conversations about elder-hood. Umm.. and also embracing that term and sometimes I see
people flinch, when I talk about elder-hood that they think of it as a decaying time and… and I think, I
think of elder-hood as a time of wisdom and a time of freedom so I… in my practice wanna invite people
to maybe get a new idea about there are new possibilities so this is some of the work that I'm doing. So
we're going to introduce you in a few minutes to Donna.
00:04:15
Introduction to counseling session
00:04:15
VANESSA JACKSON I wanna introduce you to my client, Donna. And I wanna give you a little bit of
background on her. Donna's in her 60s and she is someone who is both still parenting, a teenager at her
home, has adult children, and also is really having to take a lot of responsibility for her parents. At this
time in her life, she's also negotiating a life as a divorced person. So she's got lots of pressures, lots of
layers into her life that she's coming to therapy and she's trying to understand dealing with the hurt and
disappointment around the divorce but also the way that it shifts her life 'cause she was on one
trajectory, for what, retirement and aging would look like. And this is thrown everything into sort of
disarray and she's having to figure out how to negotiate taking care of parents, and children, and really
still finding time for herself. And so that's what brings her to therapy and we're… and it's really my, my
opportunity to help her to think about the pieces of her life that are changed and thinking about the
new possibilities that could open up for her as she moves through times of loss and confusion. Okay,
Donna, how are you doing?
00:05:30
DONNA I'm doing okay. I'm doing okay.
00:05:30
VANESSA JACKSON Okay. I'm hearing okay and then your face is saying something else so what's going
on?
00:05:35
DONNA Umm… Well, it's, it's been kind of a rough week, you know, things on the job have been really,
really tough and I'm tired and then I just have to come home and get a call from my son who needs
money 'cause he kind of, he's low for rent and I have to Uber to work 'cause I don't have a working car
but then he needs it more than I do so I gave it to him. And then I also have to go, take dinner to my
parents and it just seems like I'm a hamster in a wheel and there's just no way out.
00:06:15
VANESSA JACKSON You're sandwiched.
00:06:15
DONNA Yes.
00:06:15
VANESSA JACKSON Okay.
00:06:20
DONNA Very much so.
00:06:20
VANESSA JACKSON This is what you thought that you'd be at this point in your life?
00:06:25
DONNA No. No, I thought I would be able to share this with my husband that I could go to him, or maybe
he could help our son, and then I can go to… I thought I would, I never ever pictured myself here, alone
never, carrying everything by myself. [Show Less]