Ask the carer before you ask about the patient
Every single conversation starts with how the ill person is doing. The carer is asked second, or not at all.
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Why it lands
A carer fields the same opening question dozens of times a week and answers it as a kind of unpaid press officer. Nobody asks about them, partly because it feels self-indulgent to enquire and partly because the ill person is obviously the story. The result is a person doing the hardest job in the house who has not been the subject of a conversation in months.
How
Reverse the order deliberately and make it obvious: “Before you tell me about Dad — how are you?” Then wait through the reflex deflection and ask once more. That second ask is where the real answer lives.
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