Caregiving: Taking care of yourself

Mike: Yeah, I think one of the hardest things about being a caregiver is kind of admitting that you are a caregiver no matter what you are because sometimes you feel like what we do with our parents even though they don’t live that close to us, you know they’re two, three hours away, we’re still caregiving, right?

Kim: Exactly, so we wanted to bring somebody to talk to today Wendy Taddeucci who is a Caregiver Coach. I think Wendy one of the things is mike’s mentioning that sometimes I feel like I felt like I didn’t really count that I didn’t feel like I could count myself as a “caregiver” because I wasn’t doing physical hands-on care with my mom but yet I’m managing doctor’s appointments. Oh gosh, the orders for the blood work didn’t come in hold on you stay there let me call the doctor’s office, I did that just yesterday, you know, so I feel like how do we why is it so important to still finally say okay even if I’m not doing physical caregiving as long as I’m managing and involved really makes me a caregiver?

Wendy: Yeah, absolutely, great question Kim and I hear this a lot am I doing enough to be qualified to be called myself a caregiver am I doing the right things. I’m not really hands-on caregiving, so is this me and yet these individuals like you are doing all the things and here’s the problem, right when they don’t identify with themselves as being a caregiver, then they aren’t able to ask for help because they haven’t identified themselves as a caregiver and when you can’t identify yourself as a caregiver, you don’t ask for help, you don’t ask for support because in your mind that’s not who you are and what happens is when you don’t ask for help when you don’t ask for support you’re in this all alone, you have no community, you have no circle of support, you are run down, you’re frustrated, you are feeling resentment, you’re feeling angry, you’re feeling all the things and you’re in it on your own and yet you are a caregiver and once you can identify as such that’s when your world becomes so much better, yeah.

Mike: You know there are so many things I hate to bring up examples because they’re negative but there’s so many things that you can bring up that you admit to being something you admit that you do something like that and supposedly it’s going to make you feel better in this case I see it more of owning it I’m going to own the fact that yes I’m a caregiver and I’m going to be good at it, I’m going to get all the help that I need.

Wendy: Yeah exactly face it, face it own it, this is who I am, this is part of who I am right it doesn’t make me it doesn’t define me totally right but this is part of who I am.

Kim: Will you share a little bit about how you got so involved with wanting to help take care of caregivers? It comes from a very personal experience.

Wendy: Yeah both my mom and my dad so I’ve been caregiving for my mom for the past 10 years when I say caregiving I am doing the stuff in the background to make sure that mom has everything she needs she’s happy she’s healthy I’m her entertainment at times right but she lives in a retirement community and they’ve got all the hard stuff to do and I am so thankful for them right so it came from my mom and also seeing her caregive throughout my entire life right so from the beginning I can remember her caregiving to um her mother-in-law who lived next door and then to my father who passed away when I was six and I’ll tell you about that that’s part of my story too right saw her caregiving to him saw her caring for her parents saw her caring for um my stepfather uh when he developed Alzheimer’s so I’ve seen her care like this caregiving has been a part of my life in in the in the fringes right for many years um and so my mom my dad um my dad passed away when I was six years old of cancer and what happened was and what my mom shared with me many years later I was in my 20s I think when she said um you know your dad was taking your mom’s or your dad was taking his mother’s prescription pain meds because he was experiencing symptoms and they were pretty severe

I would imagine to be taking prescription pain medication. So dad was caring for his mother who lived next door right and uh he was he worked full time you know he was a farmer he drove the school bus he worked for a local um farm co-op you know spraying others fields and doing all that stuff and also taking care of me and mom and spending time right and so he was so engrossed in taking care of his mother right he didn’t go to the doctor when he we wish that he would have, right.

She passed away and I don’t know how long it was after that that he finally did go to the doctor when he went to the doctor it was cancer it had gone um all throughout his body and there was nothing that they could do that’s why that’s why I do what I do because on my watch that’s not going to happen..

Kim: I just can’t imagine how difficult that was to find out at a later age that right if dad had taken had maybe, and we never know, but if he had gone to the doctor and caught it early maybe the outcome could have been very different and so I I see that that really drives you as the importance of caregivers when once you identify yourself as one being able to ask for help and not not let yourself run down because the truth is if you don’t take care of yourself as a caregiver you can’t help the person you’re taking care of if if you’re not doing well

Wendy: exactly 100%

Mike: and I love the fact that that you talk about kind of emulating your mom and seeing your mom be a caregiver and that kind of drives you to to be something similar because I think Kim and I have talked about it in the past that a lot of times what you’ve experienced watching other caregivers. I watched my dad be a caregiver for my grandfather after he had a stroke back around 1980. In his later years last few years of his life my dad was a hands-on caregiver in so many ways and that has gonna led me to show me how I should help with my mom and my dad and and I think it’s so hey I think it’s good in that way but it’s also eye-opening that you should see how not only how you do it but how others do it because maybe maybe you were just watching the way your parents did it but maybe there are other ways

Wendy:There are certainly other ways. There is no one way to be a caregiver.. as long as you are first of all taking care of yourself. First and foremost, let me say this, that’s the right way to be a caregiver – there is one right way: take care of yourself first.

Kim: So now that we have identified ourselves, that yes we are caregivers, whether we are doing physical care or just coordinating doctors’ appointments and helping them find the right place to live and making sure their yard gets mowed or whatever it is that you’re doing, things all those things helping with technical problems, what are some of the things that we can do to make sure that we can do it the best that we can? Because every situation is different and I think one that we see this in the group all the time, that you can’t make a judgment on how somebody else is doing it because every situation is different, you don’t know the family dynamics the, whatever else could be at play, so it’s having just to be owning your own experience with your own parents or your in-laws. What are the things that we can do as caregivers to make sure that we can be the best caregivers that we can be?

Wendy: Yeah, of course, great question and the first thing is to face it, right face what you’re avoiding. If you’re avoiding calling yourself a caregiver, get your mind right with that and just say yes, this is who I am, this is part of who I am.

Second question, this is a powerful powerful thing to ask, right as you are a caregiver, asking yourself, what am I doing to take care of me today, what am I doing to take care of myself, and if you have no answer, think of one, even just a very small step.

Taking care of yourself, asking yourself that question, what are you avoiding? This is also a big thing, not just identifying yourself as a caregiver but are you avoiding, you know, are you feeling resentful to your loved one, are you fear of feeling fear, are you feeling anger, are you feeling guilt? Acknowledge that. It’s okay to feel all those things, it’s perfectly normal to feel all those things as a caregiver, so just notice it when you can notice exactly what you fear, then you can finally get some relief and also begin to take good care of yourself. That’s one step.

Mike: I think one of the hard parts is that every caregiver has a different situation, whether it’s different relationships with mom or dad, different financial constraints, different medical problems with whom they’re caregiving, so it’s hard to say, “well, do this” because everyone is different, but we have so many people in the group who say, “oh my gosh, I’m having this problem with mom because she’s upset about how the house isn’t clean enough” or “I’m having this problem with dad because he doesn’t want to do anything”. Do we need to do something to set the boundaries to be able to have a better relationship or a better form of communication with our parents?

Wendy: Yes, of course, strong boundaries are critical and I’ll give you an example. So one of my clients, Lauren, had no boundaries in the beginning and as a result she really hurt her back pretty badly trying to lift her mother-in-law up and off of the floor, which she had no business doing right. She didn’t know how to do it the correct way and quite honestly she’s a very small woman and just really hurt her back. Through working with me, she set up really strong boundaries with her mother-in-law, with her husband. Lauren and her husband are caring for his mother, her mother-in-law, and when she has set up those strong boundaries, now they have things in place, if mom falls this is what happens, it is not up to Lauren to pick her up off of the floor, nor should it be. So her mother-in-law has better care and Lauren is beginning to take great care of herself, and in fact her back is getting much better through chiropractic and then also from working with me to release that anger and that resentment that she was feeling, right, because that’s part of it if you are feeling that in your body, your body is going to let you know about it, yes.

Kim: So what do you because I know that we have people in the group who will say, I just, I don’t have time, my parent lives with me and I’m on duty 24/7 you know right in some cases especially if they’re medical situations and they can’t afford necessarily to bring people in to help or things like that, you know are there some creative solutions potentially that could help?

Wendy: Yes, and so everybody’s different right, every situation is different, but the one thing that I have found helpful in this case with the caregivers that are 24/7 right is to get a circle of support gathered around them. And what I mean by that is literally I have had clients, like list out your circle of support, who makes you laugh, who can come over and deliver a hot meal to you, who can you cry to, who can you just let it all out, who can you call and say, can you sit with mom or dad for like half an hour, like take a nap or take a shower or something like this, right? So get that circle of support, write those people down, right, and then reach out and ask for help.

Kim: Yeah, I guess kind of going back to like when we had newborns then you needed to be able to either have “I’ll watch your kid if you watch mine” or you know different things like that, so there’s exactly. I guess it’s so it’s really trying to take that minute to be creative and think of solutions rather than just thinking “I’ve got to do it all myself.”

Wendy: Yeah, again, take care of yourself, yeah, bingo, yeah.

Kim: Well thank you so much for these great ideas. I think that hopefully this will help our caregivers who are all caregivers in our group be able to really feel like okay I know because I think people know that it’s important to take care of yourself, sure, but we don’t often think about what could happen if we don’t and we really aren’t any good to our loved one if we are not in good health ourselves, yeah we appreciate all these tips, thanks so much Wendy.

Wendy: Oh, you’re quite welcome, thank you.

Kim: a lot to think about because I think it is that is interesting that I think I was one that a lot for a long time just thought “well I’m not really a caregiver” does it count and as the more time that I spend doing things to help my mom and or just thinking about things you realize yeah I really am.

Mike:Yeah and you don’t just admit to it you own it, right?

Mike: Exactly, there you go, there you go, hey if you want to have any discussion about anything, any topics let us know and we’ll talk to an expert here on Parenting Aging Parents.

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