I had the chance to meet with my health coaching patient about a week ago, and had a great time speaking with her. She is an 88 year old woman who seems to be in impeccable health overall. She goes to exercise classes twice a week, eats a healthy, low-fat, low-meat diet, and has strong social support from her two daughters, one of whom lives next door. We covered a wide variety of topics, and overall, seems very happy with her health. I was very happy with the relationship we were able to establish, and it was a pleasure to listen to her. However, there were two particular issues that she wanted to address that she felt were impacting her quality of life.
She mentioned that since her daughter has moved in next door, they had been spending a great deal of time at happy hours and restaurants. However, she has gained some weight as a result, and would like to bring that down. However, she doesn’t particularly like utilizing exercise machines, and didn’t feel confident in increasing her activity to counteract the worsening of her diet. She also made it clear that she didn’t want to give up her time with her daughter, for obvious reasons.
Finally, she mentioned that she had been having trouble with her hearing aid recently, and found it embarrassing to have to constantly ask people to repeat themselves. However, she didn’t feel that her audiologist would be able to let her choose a hearing aid that would be right for her, and would instead push her to buy specific products. I wasn’t sure exactly how to go about approaching this problem other than to be sympathetic, as I’m not sure what the limits are to what I’m allowed to encourage and discourage as a health coach in this situation. I would really appreciate being able to help my patient with this issue, as it seems to be what is clearly bothering her the most.