(This story is by Margie Culberton, an AARP Mississippi volunteer and freelance writer. Her photo is at the left.)
“I’m an exhausted caregiver on the point of collapse. In caring for my sick husband and father, and my demented mother, I feel I’ve ceased to exist as a person.” So says Cary Tennis in her online cry for help. And Nancy L. Snyderman, a physician as well as caretaker for her elderly father, echoes these words: “During the tough times I, like so many others, forgot to check in with myself. Within months I had put on 15 pounds, was sleeping five hours a night and was just emotionally raw. I didn’t know then what I know now — that caregiver burnout is real and that the stress of caregiving comes on like a full-frontal assault.
Must the picture look so bleak for caregivers? The website Cancer.Net says no, caregivers aren’t doomed to feel “exhausted” and “emotionally raw.” But, they emphasize, you must be willing to take a very important first step: admit that you need help. This is the one important step that Dr. Snyderman took. She looked at her situation and had to admit that she needed help.
Therefore, stop for a moment and notice any signs of stress you might be experiencing, including exhaustion, frequent sickness, sleepiness, impatience, irritability, forgetfulness, depression, anxiety, withdrawing, or any one of the many other symptoms of stress. Then scour the landscape for all the assistance that is available in your community including religious organizations, volunteer groups, government agencies, etc. And don’t forget family and friends. You may feel you must shoulder all the responsibility by yourself, but you don’t.
The National Resource Directory website is just one place where you’ll find caregiver assistance organizations, groups, and agencies here in Mississippi. Another helpful website was born out of the 1965 federal Older Americans Act and its subsequent amendments. Reauthorized in 2013, the bills established the National Family Caregiver Support Program and the program’s very helpful Eldercare Locator. You can use this Locator to search by topic or location. Also, the Family Caregiver Alliance has several options in the way of help. They list online support groups, a set of web pages called the “Family Care Navigator” where a page is devoted to help available in each state. Mississippi’s page contains dozens of links and phone numbers to everything from governmental agencies, hospices, disease-specific sites and more.
Of course, none of these resources will help you unless you make caring for yourself a priority. This does not make you selfish. In fact, the first guideline in the Caregiver’s Bill of Rights posted by Utah’s Coalition for Caregiver Support says, “I have the right to take care of myself. This is not an act of selfishness.” Further, in a Psychology Today article entitled Is Self-Care Selfish? the author writes, “As we learn better self-care, we become better people in general. If we are filling our own emotional tanks with self-respect and loving care, we have much more to give to our families, friends, and the world in general.” So be kind and patient with yourself. Take care of your body: exercise, eat healthy foods, and get enough sleep.
Finally, if you need one more reason why you should take care of yourself, simply realize that taking care of your emotional health and physical needs makes you a truly caring caregiver!
(This is the final column in our five-part series on caregivers. Next month, we will focus on what is being called “The Alzheimer’s Epidemic.” To contact Margie, email her at humorandlife@gmail.com.)