Ask Aunt Dorcas: The Reluctant Caregiver

When Paul came home from the hospital.

Dear Aunt Dorcas, 

I have a question about the times when you feel resentful at what really must be done.

I feel like a horrible person to admit this but old people are not my thing. I love children. Give me anything to do with children. God’s sense of humor, or else just my rough edges that need smoothed off, have brought quite a few old people who need help into my life. I helped care for my grandma, my mom’s mom, when I was still living at home, until she passed away.  My husband and I helped take care of my dad for months after he had a stroke. He was at my sister's but we were there two or three days a week. And now my elderly mother-in law needs care and I am feeling obligated to take her in, just because of the family situation. My husband’s sisters can travel to help out sometimes but the main work will fall on me.  I know from experience with my dad and grandma how burned out the main caregivers get. My husband had to sacrifice so much for me to care for my dad that I owe him help and support with his mom, but honestly I feel resentful at being in this position. I hate to express this to my husband because it puts him in a very hard position. How can I keep a cheerful attitude when frankly I’m burned out?

--Brenda

Dear Brenda,

I thought I knew about caregiving. After all, I birthed five babies and raised six children, so I knew all about the bone-weary exhaustion, the endless needs, and the utter dependence.

I also watched my parents grow old. This process was filled with endless impossible dilemmas, countless discussions with siblings in which we couldn’t find solutions, numerous flights across half the country, and far too many times when both my children and my parents needed me, and I could not take care of both of them at once.

Then my husband was horribly injured in a fall, and I learned about caregiving in a whole new way, when all the relationship rules and patterns are suddenly ripped to shreds and you have to figure it out on the fly. When a strong person is suddenly weak, and the previous support person has to grow a rigid spine overnight and give stern orders to the previously in charge person. And when an independent person, in one instant, is in severe pain and can't even rub his eye or feed himself.

Caregiving is done out of sight. It takes every ounce of your energy, time, and resources, yet it earns little applause and usually no money.

And yet, we take it on because it is right, because we know that a human life has value, and a helpless human deserves care and kindness. We do it because we love.

We do what needs to be done, and, in the process, we find out we are much stronger than we thought.

And we are weaker than we knew. Sometimes the utter physical weariness overwhelms us, and the emotional exhaustion threatens to put us in such dark places that we are close to needing care ourselves.

My children are adults, and my parents have gone to be with Jesus, so I’ve had time to process those caregiving roles. My husband has recovered astonishingly and can brush his own teeth again and even drive a car, yet he is still healing, and we are both processing what we’ve been through and who we are now.

Here’s my advice. Keep in mind that it comes from an unfinished story.

1.       Discuss options with family members. Can Grandma’s care be rotated? Does she need professional care at a nursing home? Does the county provide in-home respite care?  If you take on caregiving out of guilt, because someone else could do it but you feel like saying No isn’t an option, the resentment later on will eat you alive. Grandma doesn’t deserve that.

2.       If you see that the only option is for you to take on the caregiving, then set your face like a flint and do it. You are a strong woman. You can do what needs to be done. You can not let this precious life be abandoned to bedsores and reeking Depends.

3.       However. You need to ask for help. Repeat after me: ASK FOR HELP. Other family members, church people, Medicare programs, Hospice, and friends. Your husband’s sister needs to come for a week in June so you can go to your niece’s wedding. Your mother-in-law’s church people should provide respite care and occasional meals.
My brother and his wife, who were our parents’ main caregivers, let us know when they needed to travel and needed one of us to come stay with Mom and Dad.
When Paul was injured, I felt terrible asking my children to get up at night with him. But I did it anyhow. I had been through my own trauma, and there wasn’t that much of me left.

4.       Talk to someone else. Not your husband, in this case. Maybe your sister is a good safe person to vent to about your mother-in-law and how her false teeth click when she smacks her oatmeal, and you think it will drive you clear out of your mind by next week, if not tomorrow morning. Plus she drools! You can handle Depends but drooling is going to be the end of you.
Find your person. Talk to them. Go back to doing what needs to be done.

5.       Take care of yourself. Shower. Brush your teeth. Eat good food. You need to do this. Monitor your mental health. Your heroism has a limit. There are other options. None of them might be pretty, but sometimes we only get to choose between really distasteful options.

6.       Choose to embrace this season as God’s call for you. There will be times when you want to escape this life so desperately that you’ll fantasize about grabbing your purse and walking out to the car, right now, and driving off to California.  That level of desperation is usually a sign that you need more support, but it’s also a chance to deliberately embrace this season as a clear calling and exactly what you’re supposed to be doing. Think of it, all the people out there wondering what God’s will for their lives might be. Well. You know. This right here. God sees and knows. You are not abandoned. It’s going to be ok. Choose to embrace instead of escape.

As I mentioned, I’m mostly on the other side of the caregiving assignments. I have no regrets about immersing myself in caring for my babies, but I didn’t take care of myself like I should have. I had seasons of depression that got really bad before I asked for help. I regret that.

Sometimes I wonder what we could have done to make Mom and Dad’s care easier, and I still don’t know. Should we have insisted that they come to Oregon and live with us? Should we have moved them into assisted living? They wanted to live in their own home until they died, and I am all about giving the elderly as much autonomy as possible, but it sure put us in some impossible situations.

I also have no regrets about bringing Paul home from the hospital instead of putting him in a skilled care facility like the doctors thought we should. By God’s providence, our children were all in the area and able to help with his care. I think it will go down in family history as a very precious time. Others helped with meals, the family business, and so much more.

Because of the help we got, I was able to take a nap in my cabin every day. I couldn’t get out much, but I was able to call people and talk about what I was going through. For example, my friend Hope had also suffered a broken neck, and my friend Sharon is taking care of her elderly mom.  Both felt like lifesavers.

You are in a hard season, and you didn’t ask for it. If this is God’s assignment, he will give you what it takes. But you need to monitor how you're all doing and speak up about what you need.

I wish you well.

Aunt Dorcas