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| Multiple Sclerosis Plan Of Care |
If anticipating and planning for the unknowns and negative eventualities of life make people so uncomfortable, how do we motivate ourselves to turn our thoughts in this direction? How do we overcome our anxieties and turn the process into something that is reassuring and affirming? This is not an easy task for anyone, but once the planning process is underway, it can bring a sense of mastery and control to one's future, and a confidence in one's ability to meet whatever turns and detours lie ahead.
Fortunately, we live in a time when planning for the future and anticipating the support one might need to remain active and independent are receiving increasing public attention. With modern medicine and the technological advances of recent years, life expectancy in our society is the highest that it has ever been.
Where previously families tended to provide the safety net of care for their members, today's fragmented and mobile population means that many families are not available to assume this role. In addition, many households depend on the employment of all adult family members in order to meet expenses, a reality that certainly impacts the availability of family support. When you add to this scenario the rising cost of purchasing assistance and services, it is understandable why our society is beginning to give increasing attention to long-term care insurance, financial planning, elder law specialization, and various other strategies to anticipate and address future care needs.
This blog is designed to help you think comfortably and constructively about the long-term care needs that a person with MS might encounter. Could there be a time when you or a family member with MS might need help with personal care such as dressing, bathing, transferring, or toileting? What about meal preparation, grocery shopping, laundry, housekeeping, or money management? Although it is advisable for everyone - with or without MS - to anticipate a future decline in health and avoid crises through careful life planning, living with a chronic, variable, and unpredictable disease such as MS makes this endeavor even more critical.
In addition, once a diagnosis of MS has been established, options such as the purchase of disability insurance and/or long-term care insurance may no longer be available. Alternative creative and thoughtful strategies will need to be explored.
Although finding such alternatives may seem a daunting task, it is seldom the development of the plan that is the most challenging aspect of this process. What can be even more difficult is addressing the anxiety and fear that can come with that planning, and moving from seeing such planning as "giving in" to the disease, to seeing the planning process as the vehicle by which choices will be assured and quality of life maintained. To find out more, you can check out Multiple Sclerosis Plan Of Care.