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Managing The Stress ~ Making The Decisions ~ Discovering The Meaning |
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Caregiving |
Solutions To Your Caregiving Situations Throughout Your Caregiving Years |
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Rejuvenate to keep resilience Often, you become used to certain schedules, behaviors and struggles. Your ability to accept these changes is good, but sometimes you need to step back and re-evaluate your role as caregiver. Stepping back brings you perspective, so you take inventory of your current needs—and your care recipient's. When you keep a healthy perspective, you keep your resilience strong and well-toned. Some suggestions: 1. Take a break--and not just for a day! Call nursing homes and assisted living facilities to find out about their short-term respite stay policies. Ask relatives if they can pitch in and spell you for a week or two. Let them know how difficult caregiving has become for you--and how much better you'll feel after a break. 2. Schedule an appointment with the doctor for your care recipient. Perhaps your care recipient's condition has changed--and you're too close to the situation to realize it. A thorough physical exam may uncover some medical problems that proper treatments can help. 3. Re-evaluate your care recipient's care regime. Last year, your care recipient could bathe and toilet himself, with your supervision. Now, you find yourself involved in lifting and transferring. Is it time to find professional help? Contact local home health agencies to find out what services they offer. Your care recipient attends an adult day care center once a week. That used to be a nice break for the two of you. But now you find that you feel so housebound. Can you increase your care recipient's attendance to two or three days per week? 4. Understand your limits--and have plans in place when you've reached your limits. Are you comfortable providing care as long as your father can bathe himself? Have you decided that you want your mother to live with you as long as she is continent? Or, have you decided that you can provide care in your home as long as you and your husband work, but as soon as you both retire, you would like to travel more? Know what community organizations and health care facilities can take over when you've reached your limits. Every caregiver has his or her own limits--a successful caregiver understands that and plans for the future. 5. Keep your own future alive. Save for your retirement, daydream about future vacation destinations and make time for your own hobbies and interests. |
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