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Pity the cranky woman who lives down the street – down the hall – down the bed – from where you live. She is somebody’s daughter / mother / caregiver. This is National Family Caregivers Month. Most caregivers are female Baby Boomers. For six minutes, walk a mile in that woman’s high heels.
She is not noble, but, frustratingly, everyone believes she is. The truth is, her work is something she “fell into” when someone she cared about suddenly needed attention – a lot of attention.
Acquaintances believe she does get a little time off from giving care, but don’t kid yourself, it is not carefree time when she throws back her head laughing with wild abandon. She started out believing that caregiving could be a part time effort or that it wouldn’t last “that long.”
Now, wherever she goes, people know her as “that lady who cares for…” her son / mother / husband / friend. It is an identity she cannot escape, and it is a job that waits for no one. If an urgent circumstance arises, the evening plans are off. On her hours away from giving direct care, she’s trying to figure out how to find that obscure food / therapy / medicine / toy that might make her helpless friend feel better. It is a guilt-making task where the caregiver feels she is never does the job well enough, while the people around her pat her on the back and tell her she doesn’t give herself enough credit.
Her “helpless friend” may sometimes be cranky and hard to live with, but, as they say, “It’s not a sprint, it’s a marathon,” meaning, you can’t pick the good days and work only when everything is fine; you have to be present on the difficult days also.
Caregiving gobbles up your life. You don’t have time to do other things, or when you try to participate in outside activities, a crisis arises that drags you back. The people around you — normal people who aren’t tethered to someone who requires so much — don’t understand why you can’t just let someone else “deal with it.” A caregiver is viewed as someone who is a little neurotic. She appears to be someone who just needs to be needed.
The truth is, when she does get a little time away, she just recuperates, building up strength for the next tangle. It isn’t easy to be married to someone who is continually distracted from what’s going on right here, in this moment, the way she constantly is. She is not capable of being a very good friend — she just doesn’t have it to give. If she allows herself to, she feels rather sorry for herself, but also, she feels very very sorry for the helpless person who depends so heavily on her. Nobody else seems to notice that person’s existence. When others talk baby-talk to her friend or advise her about how she should “take some time off,” or just put her friend in “one of those places,” it is maddening.
At a certain point she just gives up on trying to explain herself to others because so many people are intent on telling her what they feel is so obvious, while overlooking what she feels is so obvious. Right now, her friend is still “here.” The caregiver is the lifeline. If she quits or gives up or leaves, her friend may deteriorate from a broken heart.
Caregiving may provide some joyful moments, depending on whether the situation can get better and not just worse. But after awhile, it is just a lonely and tediously long endeavor of trying to make someone comfortable who is not going to be comfortable. The caregiver carries with her the melancholy belief that, if she walks away from her duty, what will happen some day when she herself needs care? Will the people she believes she can trust one day walk away from her, also? Will everyone forget that she’s still in there?
There are other stories about Baby Boomers and caregiving at Examiner.com, written by Cynthia Rush. She thanks you for visiting.
