jc55
Member
- Joined
- Oct 5, 2005
- Messages
- 10
- Country
- US
- State
- Ohio
- City
- carrollton
please be warned about reading my thoughts on post caregiving. This may be graphic...
One day, you will wake up in a panic. The house will be quiet, you will have nowhere to go for the day. No food to blend, no machines to fiddle with, no diapers to change. You'll realize that you've slept in until 10am for the first time in 3 years. Your heart will start racing and you'll find yourself fighting to catch your breath as the realization hits you that your loved one is gone. You'll panic and try to catch your breath as you cry outloud and yell that you are sorry that you didn't do it better. You yell her name and you apologize but she's gone. You'll realize that you are healthy and that her life was so short, tragic, and now gone. You'll pace the house constantly because there is nothing to do...your routine has suddenly been taken away. You can go anywhere in the country today but you don't because you have nowhere to go. You'll start reflecting on those times when you couldn't go on, couldn't take one more sleepless night. All of those hours face down on the floor crying out to God for help will be over. All of those times you didn't have the strength so you slept in the other room and cried yourself to sleep. The denial, the curses, the sweat, the sacrifices, the impatience....will someday be over. But how you would give 15 more minutes to go through family pictures or show them the children's last report card.
So today...love them while you have them. When you wake up at 3 am and there is a trail of feces from the bed, all over the house and into to the bathroom...love. When you wake up for the 10th time on a work night to move an uncomfortable limb seemingly 1/2 MM...love. When your bank account runs dry ordering online stuff that will never be used and the medical bills keep piling up...love. When you see your kids social skills lag behind their peers, stuck in the house with no friends, and you realize that you don't have any either...love.
You are taking care of someone who has a soul and was put here on this earth for a purpose. This is a great honor and something primal about having compassionately cared for another human being. You want this hell to end but 45 seconds after it does your eyes will be opened to the fact that this wasn't about you...it was about them. You will then realize how courageous and brave THEY really were. Everything changes when they are gone...you cannot prepare for how you will feel afterwards. You'll have your rest one day and you'll rediscover who you are again as a person, but for now please don't give up.
Please hang on caregivers. You are all heroes and will wear this as a badge of honor knowing when no one else was around, you ran the race. You were faithful, strong, committed, caring and that you loved, really loved, for real loved with no regrets.
One day, you will wake up in a panic. The house will be quiet, you will have nowhere to go for the day. No food to blend, no machines to fiddle with, no diapers to change. You'll realize that you've slept in until 10am for the first time in 3 years. Your heart will start racing and you'll find yourself fighting to catch your breath as the realization hits you that your loved one is gone. You'll panic and try to catch your breath as you cry outloud and yell that you are sorry that you didn't do it better. You yell her name and you apologize but she's gone. You'll realize that you are healthy and that her life was so short, tragic, and now gone. You'll pace the house constantly because there is nothing to do...your routine has suddenly been taken away. You can go anywhere in the country today but you don't because you have nowhere to go. You'll start reflecting on those times when you couldn't go on, couldn't take one more sleepless night. All of those hours face down on the floor crying out to God for help will be over. All of those times you didn't have the strength so you slept in the other room and cried yourself to sleep. The denial, the curses, the sweat, the sacrifices, the impatience....will someday be over. But how you would give 15 more minutes to go through family pictures or show them the children's last report card.
So today...love them while you have them. When you wake up at 3 am and there is a trail of feces from the bed, all over the house and into to the bathroom...love. When you wake up for the 10th time on a work night to move an uncomfortable limb seemingly 1/2 MM...love. When your bank account runs dry ordering online stuff that will never be used and the medical bills keep piling up...love. When you see your kids social skills lag behind their peers, stuck in the house with no friends, and you realize that you don't have any either...love.
You are taking care of someone who has a soul and was put here on this earth for a purpose. This is a great honor and something primal about having compassionately cared for another human being. You want this hell to end but 45 seconds after it does your eyes will be opened to the fact that this wasn't about you...it was about them. You will then realize how courageous and brave THEY really were. Everything changes when they are gone...you cannot prepare for how you will feel afterwards. You'll have your rest one day and you'll rediscover who you are again as a person, but for now please don't give up.
Please hang on caregivers. You are all heroes and will wear this as a badge of honor knowing when no one else was around, you ran the race. You were faithful, strong, committed, caring and that you loved, really loved, for real loved with no regrets.
