Living arrangements in Canada look very different than the families of the 1950 and 60’s. In fact, multigenerational households (housing three or more generations) are increasing faster than all family household types. This is happening for a variety of reasons, personal choice, financial circumstances, aging population, cultural preferences, and a housing shortage.
This living arrangement can be beneficial to family wellbeing, enabling intergenerational relationships, providing support to family members, and to ease financial burdens associated with food and housing insecurity. While there are several benefits the experience can also contribute to stressors contributing to arguments, hurt feelings and sometimes even fear.
In an Intergenerational Mediation, Christine as third-party neutral helps families to improve communication between young people (over 12 years old), siblings, parents, guardians, care providers and other family members. In this process families will learn to talk and listen to each other, improve communication styles, increase understanding, and together resolve conflict.
Common areas of Intergenerational Conflict include:
- Living arrangements
- Role Expectations
- Cultural and generation gaps
- Care provisions for vulnerable family members
- Estate Planning (health and finance)
- Communication Styles
- Authoritarian behaviour, power struggles
Families can begin to address their conflict(s) in a non-confrontational process, equipped with tools for safety and problem solving aimed to improve increase personal insights and improve family decision-making. Through an Intergenerational Mediation, family relationships can begin to communicate needs, change negative engagement patterns, and transform.