By Donna Schempp, LCSW

Whether you become a caregiver gradually or all of sudden due to a crisis, or whether you are a caregiver willingly or by default, many emotions surface when you take on the job of caregiving. Some of these feelings happen right away and some don’t surface until you have been caregiving for awhile. Whatever your situation, it is important to remember that you, too, are important. All of your emotions, good and bad, about caregiving are not only allowed, but valid and important.

Below are some of the common, often hard-to-admit, feelings that caregivers experience. Once identified, suggestions for how you might better cope with these feelings are offered.

• Ambivalence: This is the feeling of both wanting to be doing what you are doing and the feeling of not wanting to be doing it. On bad days, one often has the feeling of wishing you didn’t have to be there, that this ordeal will be over soon. On good days, caring for someone can be a gift to both you and the care receiver. Coping: Allow yourself to feel both sets of feelings. Everyone has these feelings sometimes. Neither the bad feelings nor the good ones will last forever.
• Anger: Anger and frustration are a normal part of being around someone who needs help on an ongoing basis and who might not be accepting of help. Caring for someone with dementia, in particular, can be even harder. It’s not always possible to be in perfect control of your emotions. Anger “just comes out” sometimes. Coping: Forgive yourself. Find constructive ways to express yourself, learn to walk away and give yourself a “time out.” Identify supportive people you can talk to who will listen as you vent about the things that happened that day.
• Anxiety: Feeling like things are out of control and not knowing how to bring them back into control often produces feelings of anxiousness. Coping: Pay attention to your anxiety—it is our body’s early warning system that something isn’t right. When you feel anxious: Stop. Breathe. Keep breathing. Pray. Meditate. Make some tea. Anything that will give you a break from what is happening in the moment.
• Depression/Sadness: As a caregiver, you are at risk for depression. Sometimes this is feeling hopeless or helpless, the inability to sleep, or trouble getting up and facing the day. And sometimes it makes you want to cry. Coping: Depression is treatable and should be taken seriously. Professional help is available. Talk to your physician if you think you might be depressed, join a caregiver support group, find a counselor who understands caregiving, and ask for help from friends and family. Exercise. Moving your body is a proven way to relieve some of the symptoms of depression.
• Fear: What if something happens? Will I be able to cope? Will I feel guilty? Am I responsible for things that go wrong? Caregivers take on a huge amount of responsibility, not only for the day to day care of the care receiver, but also for all the other things that “might” happen while being a caregiver. Scaring ourselves about the “what ifs” can be paralyzing and keep us from enjoying the “what is.” Coping: It is important to have contingency plans. So, it might make sense to have a back up caregiver in mind in case something should happen to you, or to think about how you would handle predictable medical emergencies based on what disabilities your care receiver has. When you get scared, it is often helpful to talk to someone who knows your situation and can give you perspective and calm your fears.
• Grief: Watching the care receiver decline, not being able to do things that used to be easy and natural is sad. We also grieve for the care receiver, the person who used to be and our relationship with that person. We often need to grieve the loss we are experiencing on a daily basis or it will come out as something else. Coping: Sometimes creating a ritual can be helpful. One caregiver would write on a piece of paper the things her husband could no longer do, then go to the ocean and throw the pieces in the water as a way of letting go. We tend to want to avoid the sadness that comes with grief, but allowing ourselves to feel (it) promotes healing.
• Guilt: Guilt is the feeling we have when we do something wrong. Guilt in caring for care receivers comes in many forms such as feeling impatient with your loved one, feeling like you are not doing a good enough job, or feeling like you could have prevented your loved one from getting hurt or sick. Coping: You need permission to forgive yourself. You can’t be perfect 24/7. It’s impossible to be in perfect control of how you feel at all times. We all carry around a lot of “shoulds,” such as “No one will do as good of a job as I do, so I have to be here all the time.”
• Impatience: How difficult is it to get your care receiver up in the morning? How about up, dressed, given breakfast and to their doctor’s appointment all before 10 a.m.? It is understandable that you would get impatient at times. Coping: Forgive yourself. When tired, frustrated, and trying to keep things under control, it’s natural to want to speed up and have compliance from the care receiver to keep them safe and healthy. So, first, slow down. Leave a lot of time to accomplish tasks. Create a list of the things you are in control of and are not.
• Jealousy: We often don’t admit to this feeling, because we have always been told not to be jealous. But that doesn’t mean that we don’t, in fact, feel jealous from time to time, of those who have it easier or better than us. Coping: It’s okay to admit to being jealous. Because things are not fair, we often have flashes of resentment and envy at other people’s good fortune compared to our own. Jealousy is a problem when we wallow in it and prevent ourselves from enjoying the things we DO have. Focus on what you do have, whatever that may be, and find a place in your heart for gratitude.
• Lack of Appreciation: Most of us do not want to be dependent on someone else. Learning to accept help is hard. So, the care receiver is often pushing away our attempts to be helpful and caring. If someone has dementia, this problem is often much worse. And we get our feelings hurt because the care receiver does not thank us or even see how much we are giving up in order to care for them. Coping: Sometimes we have to give ourselves our own pat on the back. Writing in a journal about the things you do each day might help you to appreciate how much you give and how much you do. Having a support group or a group of friends/family to cheer you on is important, and both comforting and necessary to remain resilient through your caregiving journey.
• Loneliness: The longer you are a caregiver, the more isolated you become. With no one to talk to day in and day out except the care receiver, it is easy to lose a sense of yourself. Friends stop calling since we are no longer available and we hesitate to call them because we know “they don’t want to hear about it any more” or “I have nothing to talk about because my life is all about caregiving.” Coping: Find ways to get out of the house and involved in something other than caregiving. Learn about resources from Senior Services or Seasons Adult Day that will allow you to get a much-needed and well-deserved break.

To learn more about Seasons Adult Day Health Services and how our center may help with the stress of caregiving, contact our Family Support Manager, Christin Rousseau, at 989-633-3767.