I Don't Want To Be A Suffering Caregiver
A woman walked into an Al-Anon meeting I attended several years ago and wanted to know the secret to get her husband to stop drinking. She said, "There must be something I can do that I'm not doing. I've tried everything." One of the women in the meeting told her to focus on herself and "work" the Al-Anon program. She didn't like the answer. She didn't believe the answer. She knew the answer must be "out there" somewhere. So, she kept looking "out there" for the answer.
I'm not comparing caregiving to dealing with an alcoholic. Yet, if a caregiver told me that they were suffering, I would respond by saying, "Focus on yourself. Find a meeting/workshop/teacher/psychologist to help you look inward." The answer isn't to do more or differently. The answer isn't "out there."
Perhaps if our eyes rotated 180 degrees, we might spend more of our lives looking inward. But they don't. So, we don't. That's a problem. Because what goes on inside of ourselves affects every response, reaction, belief, and attitude.
If you’re a caregiver having difficulty in this role, feeling alone, frustrated and tired with no peers to share your experiences, on a rollercoaster ride of doctor calls and appointments, bouncing between good news and bad news, having more questions than answers, suffering as you’ve seen others suffer, having tried what everyone has said to try but to no avail, then you may be ready for a fundamentally different approach.
