Caregiver stress affects both family and professional caregivers. Unchecked it can lead to serious problems… Emily juggles her career while caring for her elderly parents. Lately she feels tired and finds herself dragging through the day. Often she falls into bed exhausted and doesn’t want to get up with the alarm. Instead of facing each challenge with the enthusiasm she once had for finding a solution, now she views them as problems. Emily’s become too busy to exercise. Even following a healthy eating plan seems too stressful. And a vacation has not been part of her life for years. At... (Read More ...)

One of the loneliest times my family faced in caregiving occurred when our caregiver stress peaked; when enrolling my mother in hospice.  Finding a hospice in our rural area was a challenge.  When I found a possibility, they wanted a referral from my mother’s doctor. Unfortunately he had left the practice, and the nurse practitioner would not approve hospice without my mother coming to the office for an exam.  And she would not make house calls. Hello? If Mother could come the office we would not have been seeking hospice! Every day caregivers face similar or worse predicaments.  Feeling... (Read More ...)

Hi and welcome to CaregivingWithPurpose.com.  This year CaregivingWithPurpose.com is joining Caregiving.com’s Annual Holiday Progressive Blog Party.   It’s a fun way to reduce caregiver stress. If you’re new here, this site is to nurture and support caregivers.  I’m Ina Gilmore, and have been both a family caregiver and a physician.  I learned about multigenerational caregiving as a child.  As the oldest I helped with younger siblings.  One of my grandmothers lived with us for a while when I was a child. Caregiving With Purpose is designed to help you navigate caregiving. ... (Read More ...)

The holidays can be especially stressful for caregivers. The added work of holiday events and traditions can add to an already overwhelmed plate.  And often holidays are bittersweet, because it is a time for remembering. This week I found myself needing some words of encouragement.  December has always been a time of memories for me, including memories of caregiver stress.  If I’m not careful, I find myself wallowing in unpleasant memories of those who made their final journey Home in December.  And just when it those memories hit, I realized my Camellia plant is in bloom! The fragile... (Read More ...)

How can National Family Caregiver Month affect caregiver stress? Well, news articles about the number of caregivers and their problems can certainly help raise awareness.  And sometimes that’s enough to get help. Every U.S. President since President Clinton in 1997 has recognized caregivers every year.  The National Family Caregiver Month started as a weekly observance during Thanksgiving week, and has expanded to include the entire month of November. In this year’s Proclamation of National Family Caregivers Month, President Obama wrote, “National Family Caregivers Month is... (Read More ...)

Many people don’t think of knitting and caregiving going together. Well, they do in more ways than one. One of the most obvious is that knitting is a way to pass the time.  Many knitting projects are portable, and are handy to take along for an uncertain wait.  Like when a caregiver waits at a doctor’s office or for medical testing or treatments.  The right project can also be dropped when the caregiver needs to give care, and picked up later. Knitting is also a stress-reliever.  And it can be a solution or at least a partial solution to caregiver stress. I learned to knit about the... (Read More ...)

Caregiver stress can quickly become overwhelming.  It can sneak up on you, taking more and more of your time, energy and resources.  Or it can quickly escalate with a crisis or sudden deterioration of the one you are giving care to.  Both quilting and knitting can help you deal with caregiver stress. When my mother could no longer quilt, she enjoyed watching me piece and quilt projects.  And when she needed a hospital bed, the quilt as you go squares from an unfinished quilt made covers for the bedrails.  They added padding to the hard metal rails.  And the sunny yellow and bright blues... (Read More ...)

Caregiver stress can be dangerous, even deadly.  If you are feeling caregiver stress your health and the health of those you care for may be at risk. My friend Mindy found out just how serious caregiver stress can be.  It can affect your health, your life and even the things like knitting you enjoy and do to relieve stress. When Mindy’s parents were no longer able to care for themselves, she moved them into the house next door.  She remodeled it and took over their care, including hiring caregivers. She supervised the caregivers, soon finding herself doing more and more.  In addition to... (Read More ...)

Are you struggling with giving care to someone with a chronic illness like dementia? Sometimes is seems as though diseases like Alzheimers test your good humor and sense of humor.  You are probably dealing with many sad things. Yet if you look for it, you may just find unexpected laughter in as this recent post from Linda on her blog “God, Mom, Alzheimer’s, and Me” shows… Sound Logic The following interchange reveals why one should never argue with one’s mother, whether she has Alzheimer’s (as mine does) or not: Mom: Would you get me a diet coke? Linda:... (Read More ...)

Do you realize that many times elder care is not fun? You only have to do it for a very short time to realize how hard it is. Wondering if there’s an alternative? Yes!  One way to start is by finding the humor in situations, which can greatly relieve your caregiving stress and make caregiving less burdensome… When my mother was undergoing radiation therapy, it was a stressful time.  It was the middle of a cold, wet winter. Midway through the treatments, she lost her appetite and became depressed.  We worried she was losing her will to live.  The only thing that seemed to generate... (Read More ...)