Posted by: caregiverspirituality on: September 9, 2009
Check out this latest article from Seniors For Living.com:
Blessings,
Joe
Posted by: caregiverspirituality on: August 27, 2009
Here is an article on benefits and caregiving:
Blessings,
Joe
Posted by: caregiverspirituality on: July 27, 2009
When all is said and done, I know one thing for sure: Caregivers are busy. Caregivers care for others and also attend to children, households, and jobs. They face conflicting burdens: guilt and blessing, unrealistic expectations and failure, joy and depression. With all these ingredients mixing in a giant pot, a caregiver’s well-being begins to falter.
One of my jobs at Trinity is to help connect people with the resources of their faith. In my many interactions with caregivers, I think that Luke 10:38-42 is one of the best resources for a caregiver’s spiritual well-being. You may want to read it before continuing on.
Luke’s story tells of Martha and Mary welcoming Jesus into their home. Welcoming Jesus is an important clue to the entire passage because it shows that hospitality means receiving the very Son of God. Caregivers are hospitable people, and when they welcome another into their lives it is as if they welcome God’s presence. But the story takes a curious turn as Luke reveals Martha’s and Mary’s different methods of showing hospitality. Martha ensures that Jesus is well-cared for, while Mary “listens to Jesus’ word.”
It is natural to think that Mary is doing something that Busybody Martha fails to do; that is, take time to listen to Jesus, but there is more going on in this story. Martha is fulfilling expected obligations that society placed upon women in her time. Mary, however, is defying a gender role by “sitting at Jesus’ feet,” a place reserved for male pupils of rabbinic teachers.
Mary’s peculiar actions throw Martha’s hospitality in bold relief and awaken readers to a deeper meaning. Unlike Mary, Martha lives up to society’s expectations—she is an exceptional caregiver—but is “distracted by many things.” She allows the caregiving role to get in the way of her needs. How many caregivers provide care because they live up to the expectations of either society or family at the detriment of their own needs?
Mary tends to her spiritual needs in an unconventional way. She reminds us that we have a bit of Martha and Mary in us all; it’s just a matter of “practicing,” (as Brother Lawrence once wrote), “the presence of God.” We must balance fulfilling our obligations (Martha) with joining Jesus in a spirit of contemplative reflection (Mary), inviting God to be with us amidst the busyness of our lives.
In the second part of the story Martha challenges Jesus about Mary’s neglect. We get the sense that Martha feels alone in her caregiving, which results in a difficult and necessary question: “Don’t you care?” Martha echoes the inner conflicts of many caregivers, many of whom feel abandoned by family and even by God. Many a caregiver has wondered whether her family cares about her when she is left to do all of the work with her loved one.
Jesus does not lash out against Martha’s forceful challenge. Instead, he is pastoral and says her name twice. This shows that he is sympathetic to her. Martha is honest in her anger with Jesus, and Jesus cares enough to soothingly call her name and welcome her grief into the conversation. There is a strong relationship between Martha and Jesus, and that is the point.
As a pastor, though, Jesus does challenge Martha to make a decision. Will she choose the “good portion” like her sister, even if it means bucking societal expectations at times? Or will she continue to allow her role to consume her at the detriment of her very spiritual well-being?
The fact that we don’t know how Martha responds is important; Luke expects us to “choose our own adventure” by making a decision for Martha. Martha must choose, and so do we.
Posted by: caregiverspirituality on: July 14, 2009
This is a third article of four that focuses on caregivers. You may find sources for this article on the “caregiver resource” page at www.joelaguardia.com.
Becoming a caregiver is one of the most difficult transitions in a person’s life. It can happen overnight or over a long period of time. Either way, many people are simply not prepared to take on the “caregiver” role, especially since the role is one fraught with uncertainty, anxiety, and undo stress.
One of the first and hardest things that face a new caregiver is the transition that happens in a caregiver’s relationship with others, in particular the relationship to a care receiver. This happens when one takes on a different “role” in that relationship.
I have met numerous caregivers that have faced role transitions. Some are adult children that care for an aging parent. In this situation, the relationship changes when the caregiver is forced to do many tasks for the parent that the parent once did for the child. Caregivers suddenly realize that they are like a mother or father to their parents.
Other caregivers provide help to spouses. Role transitions in spousal care shifts expectations, communication, and intimacy. Therefore, mutual love and nurturing suffer and caregivers find that their spouses can no longer meet their relational needs. Confusion, resentment, and numbness set in.
Despite which type of transition takes place, grief is an inevitable by-product because something is “lost” in the relationship between the caregiver and care receiver. Thus, a parent is no longer mom or dad, or a spouse is “not the person that I fell in love with.” And, like any loss, the result is a “living grief” that affects one’s spiritual, emotional, physical, and mental well-being. Life becomes fractured; there is a general sense of malaise or “lost-ness.”
When grief strikes, different emotions erupt; namely, anger, hostility, and depression. These conflicting emotions can cause caregivers to lash out because they start questioning their ability to care. Caregivers can even act out against other family members, playing the “blame game” to figure out “why has this happened to me?” They ask their families: “Don’t you care for me?”
Lurking underneath all of this, however, is a third cause for grief: Caring for a loved one means coming face-to-face with death. Here, grief tramples over the strongest of hearts when it is only a matter of time before a loved one passes away. Darkness enshrouds the situation, and all hope seems lost.
There is hope. When a caregiver faces the darkness of grief, God promises light even in the most dreadful and hopeless of places. In “Caregiving: The Spiritual Journey of Love, Loss and Renewal,” author Beth McLeod argues that role transitions may be unbearable, but can open up avenues of spiritual growth for caregivers. She sees transitions as a rite of passage in which caregivers discover their identity in God. With the appropriate help and guidance, things like uncertainty, grief, and even depression can transform into a radical trust in God.
McLeod also contends that grief is not something for caregivers to deny, but to confront and muddle through. It is like a journey that recalls Psalm 23: “Ye, thou I walk through the valley of the shadow of death.” The suffering Psalter walks through the valley not around the valley, and this valley becomes a place of growth because it also happens to be a place of profound reliance upon God’s presence in the face of death.
If you are a caregiver who finds yourself in the midst of grief, or at least feeling one of the emotions that accompany caregiving, I encourage you to find a trusted guide to help you through your valley, be it a pastor, therapist, or spiritual director. Your goal should be to express your frustrations and sense of lost-ness. Be sure that this is accomplished in a safe and confidential environment that can foster renewed hope and trust in God.
Posted by: caregiverspirituality on: July 5, 2009
All names are changed and some literary licenses taken in order to protect identities. Also, the sources for facts and statistics in this article can be found at www.joelaguardia.com.
In the hot summer of 2007, Luanne poured another round of sweet tea as she told me about how caring for Mother affects her life. When she places the pitcher of sweet tea on the coffee table and settles back down into her seat, I can see shadows under her heavy-lidded eyes. But even then she can’t help but to express the pride, joy, and fulfillment she gets from caring for her mother. “A long weekend of visiting and caring for Mother,” she tells me, “makes me exhausted, but it is rewarding to care for Mother like she once cared for me.”
My friend reflects the deeply embedded feeling that many other caregivers experience: a sense of obligation on the one hand and profound feelings of blessing on the other hand, all because caring seems to be a part of God’s divine purpose. The act of giving care is just one puzzle-piece in God’s “call” for Luanne’s life. She takes another sip from her glass of sweet tea and admits, “Taking care of my mother is what I’m supposed to be doing in my life; this is where God has placed me.”
The idea that caregiving can be part of a divine purpose is not unique to Luanne. One study shows that many caregivers who provide care to others do so because they believe God has a meaningful call upon their lives. Another caregiver—Cybil— confirmed this when she once told me, “God knew I’d be the primary caregiver to my parents, and it is what God planned for me to do, so I do it.”
To have a sense of God’s “call” upon one’s life—be it a calling centered around an occupation, giftedness, or task—is something that reaches far back into Christian history. Two influential streams of thought in Christianity relate to “calling.”
The first stems from the biblical historical tradition: In the Bible, God “calls” people to be saved and to join Him to be on mission in the world.
The second comes from the Catholic and Protestant traditions: It was Martin Luther who argued that God calls people to do certain tasks or to practice certain gifts. Luther once stated that if God calls someone to be a dairy farmer, then when that farmer milks a cow it is as if God is providing drink for the entire world.
No wonder many caregivers feel that they are called to care for others. They say it is because God has given them the strength—the “calling”—to be there for Mom and Dad during a time of need.
There are, however, some negative consequences to this type of thinking. Some people think that if they are “called” by God to care for another but are unable to do so, then they have failed God. Guilt sets in. Other caregivers say, “I feel like I just can’t do enough,” so, along with guilt, there is an overwhelming sense of failure and self-condemnation. Yet, other caregivers have care receivers who simply tell them that they are not doing enough, especially if a care receiver is suffering from dementia or Alzheimer’s and can’t remember what his caregiver did for him 5 minutes ago.
In order to escape these ruts, it is important to balance a belief in “divine calling” with a healthy dose of boundary-setting. Sure, God may have put you in a position to care for a loved one, but God does not expect you to care for others at the expense of caring for yourself. And, yes, there are times when you feel like you can “do more,” but you are certainly not God; just consider that even the little things make a difference. Nor are we all world-changers, but if we follow a life of prayer and self-care, we can realize that when we provide care to the best of our abilities, it is as if we are caring for the entire world.
