Senior Living News

Genealogy projects can help you preserve your family's history. When you have a loved one in memory care, that family history can get lost quickly. Capturing your loved one's memories and doing research together can help you hold onto the details. Plus, you can turn your research into a keepsake project that your loved one can display in their memory care space.

Benefits of Doing a Genealogy Project With a Loved One in Memory Care

Genealogy projects with a loved one in memory care can be a great bonding experience. You're able to spend lots of time together talking about the past and sharing memories. It might help your loved one remember things from their past. You can also preserve their memories to keep for yourself. Creating a project can also be a sensory experience for your loved one.

Genealogy Project Ideas for Seniors

Genealogy often involves a lot of research to uncover family members, heritage and the history of the people in your family. Once you do that research, you can turn it into a project that you can leave with your loved one. This could help spark memories and give them a keepsake with family information. Some project ideas include:

• Family tree: Create a physical representation of your family tree. You can display the family tree in your loved one's room.
• Family timeline: A different variation is creating a family timeline that includes important family events, such as births, marriages and deaths. This is also something that can hang in your loved one's space.
• Scrapbook: You can make a scrapbook or memory book with your loved one that incorporates family history. Include any memories your loved one has about other relatives or family events. Photos can help your loved one remember events and people.
• Written history: Collect family stories and history in a written format. You might put the information into short stories with different titles to make them easier for your loved one to understand. Reading can become more difficult as dementia progresses, so this option is usually better for people in the earlier stages of dementia.

Ways to Get Your Loved One Involved

A loved one with dementia likely can't handle a genealogy project from start to finish on their own. Doing research can be difficult, and they might not be able to focus for long periods. However, you can get them involved in different ways. Here are some options:

• Visit a genealogy library. Even if lots of research isn't possible for your loved one, take them along with you to a genealogy library to do research. You can find genealogy resources at the St. Louis Public Library. You can also do online genealogy research with your loved one if an outing isn't possible.
• Document their memories. Depending on how advanced their memory loss is, your loved one might not have many things to share. However, it can still be beneficial to ask them to share their memories and the details they know about the family. Choose a time when they seem alert and are in a good mood.
• Give them easy-to-understand research. Doing a lot of the genealogy research yourself gives your loved one information they can use. Compile the information in a way that's easy for them to understand. Hearing names of family members or other details about their family history could spark some memories.
• Let them assemble things. If you're doing a creative genealogy project like making a crafty family tree, ask your loved one to help assemble the project. Choose activities based on their abilities, and make the tasks meaningful so they have a significant role in creating the project.

Tips for Doing a Genealogy Project

These tips can make your genealogy project with your loved one more successful.

1. Do Prep Work

Handling as much prep work as possible, like the hardcore research and preparing materials for projects, makes the task easier for your loved one. You can focus more on the project itself. It can also make the activity less frustrating for someone with dementia who might not be able to work on some parts.

2. Let Them Guide the Project

You might have to do a majority of the planning, but get your loved one as involved as possible in the project. Ask them how they want to document the family history. If they can't come up with ideas on their own, give them a few options to pick from.

3. Focus on the Time Spent Together

While documenting your family history is important, you also benefit from spending time with your loved one. Don't put too much pressure on making the activity perfect. It might not come out exactly how you imagined, but you'll create more memories that can be just as important. Document the process by taking photos and writing down your memories of the day to make it more special.

4. Save the Research

As you're working on your project with your loved one, don't forget to save the information for yourself. Scan documents and photos you find to keep a digital copy of the research. You might also create your own version of the project so you can have a copy as well.