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In reminiscence my experiences do notFade, they grow more vivid.—Marcel Proust You may already have engaged in a formal life review with an older loved one, or done one for yourself. Or you may simply have chatted with an older loved about their life experiences and memories. If you have never done either with the intent of gaining insight and wisdom for yourself, and creating a safe space for them to review their past, you are both in for a treat.Life review sorts out the story of your life in a most meaningful way. The purpose may be just sweet reminiscence, leaving a legacy of understanding for your family, or the reconciliation and coming to terms with incidents and people in your life Life Review and Life Bio are not exactly the same. Life Bio is used to denote stories and facts about your life, a journal or chronicle of the past. Life Review is more psychological. Icons in the field of gerontology like Pulitzer Prize winner, Dr. Robert Butler considered life review a natural process for human growth, while developmental psychologist Eric Erickson saw it as a life stage that comes only with age. For us caregivers and us elders, it can be a process of sharing, a way to spend vigilant hours at a bed side, or a way to make family dialogues productive and dear. But one thing that most often happens when you engage in life review with someone you care about is that you both have a deeper understanding of each other, and you have FUN!It can be hard to get started or to initiate a life review, or life bio, with an older adult unused to sharing details of their past with others. Or if you are on your own, you may feel uninspired. To get started, explore their “life in food.” Think how often a recipe, a table setting, a way you arranged flowers, or a great restaurant or barbeque sits gently on your mind. What did you eat on your first date, what did you cook at your daughter’s communion, what sold best at the bake sale, what is the family’s favorite recipe? These and hundreds of questions come up naturally when you engage in culinary life review. Ask that of yourself and your older loved one.If you are handy with a video camera, you can tape Mom or Dad actually making a recipe and cooking. For instructions on how to make a cooking video, check out www.DishAndDine.com . Then post the video on that site and You Tube. Or get a tape recorder and make an audio tape of the conversation, and include all recipes. For a webinar on how to and hints, visit http://www.asaging.org/webseminars/info_autobiography.html, from the American Society on Aging and the MetLife Foundation, 2010 with Cheryl Swenson, Ph.D. If you are not web savvy, read all about life review at “The Handbook of Structured Life Review,” by Barbara K. Height.Whatever you do, don’t let those luscious recipes and memories fade into oblivion. “When I was studying life review, I was struck by the importance of oral history and realized that history is more than the actions of politicians and generals. Prior to the 1976 bicentennial celebration of the founding of the United States, I met with anthropologists Margaret Mead and Wilton Dillon to discuss how we might record the experiences of ordinary people for posterity. That summer, we set up tables in the mall outside the Smithsonian Institution and invited people visiting Washington, D.C., to tell their stories. Americans from all over the country, from small farms and big cities, came to our tables and shared their lives.” Dr. Robert Butler, genius, advocate and father of modern gerontology, of lasting memory.
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