The Caregiver as a Wise General
Being someone who prided herself on being the Energizer Bunny — or so I was told by family, friends and work colleagues—it shocked me that by 8:00 p.m. I had to fight off the extreme urge to be horizontal, preferably on a soft non-injury-causing surface preferably my bed. My body was saying "enough!” The demands of caring for Mom and working full time created a new kind of fatigue, the kind toddlers feel when resisting a much-needed nap. Did I listen to my body and tired mind at first? No. Even though in my professional life, I met with and represented many seniors, spoke to experts and sometimes wrote recommendations for judges, I hadn’t done what John Dewey called learning by doing. I hadn’t yet integrated the physical and emotional requirements of successful long-term caregiving into my daily routine.
I’d moved in with my mother to care for her, and remained there for the six years preceding her death. Making arrangements, thinking about Mom while at work, cooking for Mom, watching Jeopardy and Wheel of Fortune with her while trying to engage her in conversation (which, before she declined, consisted of talking about the answers but later consisted of talking about how nicely Alex Trebek’s tie matched the television studio background or discussing why his hand was in a sling . . . until he told us) seemed to take up every available minute.
In short order, as I lay on the bed like a fish lacking the energy to even flail on dry land, my body was telling me it was all too, too much. Not that I needed to sleep at that moment. I needed to just trick my body into thinking I was going to sleep and then it might just cooperate and allow me to do something just a tad bit for myself, if for no other reason than to remind myself that there was a me, a sentient human being who had my own needs howsoever small at that point in time. Which meant doing something creative, creativity being an impulse I think we all have even if we do not choose to exercise it. In which case it’s sort-of like an appendix. Or not.
Which leads to my theory (And I’m a big one for coming up with theories even if they do not apply to the entire world or even most people in a similar situation): no matter how much we give as caregivers, we still have to find the time to not do, do, do. We must find some activity at the end of the day we do for ourselves that tells us we haven't disappeared entirely into our caregiving role to the exclusion of all else. My chosen activity was writing or revising a poem or sketching something —sketch class was one of many activities I had eliminated because of my caregiver duties, but the teacher had been kind enough to give me a postcard of a Michelangelo drawing and told me to copy it. How satisfying it was for those moments I engaged in the activity! For others, it could be whatever satisfies and stimulates, be it connecting with friends by phone or social media or whatever.
Or, to paraphrase some military general, I took the longer-view approach, because I didn’t want to flame out. I wanted to “live to fight another day" and be a better, saner, successful caregiver. And more literally, the “other” day would be the next day and the next with its myriad of stresses, unanticipated occurrences, weirdness and yes, even joy and through time, revelation about what a gift caregiving is to both the caregiver and the one being cared for.