A Day in the Life of a Caregiver.

I sat down to write about a day in the life of a caregiver. I thought it would be easy. I could talk about a regular day and be done with it. But the truth is, I don't have regular days and irregular days. I mean, sure there are some days that appear like any other day. To the untainted eye this would seem so. However, they aren't, because being a caregiver doesn't just change your day to day life but your thought processes, your schedule, and every decision you make. What changes is the details, and much of that happens in the unseen parts.

It took me a long time to connect with being called a “caregiver.”  It felt like some kind of honor I wasn’t deserving of.  I felt like I had been given the label “mother” without having to go through the hours of childbirth and months of pregnancy.  I just didn’t fit.  It wasn’t until months after my mom’s original prognosis that I felt ok calling myself that.  And even that didn’t happen overnight.

Perhaps this came from a place of obscurity in the word.  Even now if someone asked me what exactly a “caregiver” was, I wouldn’t be able to put it into words. 

Cancer effects your entire way of thinking.  Especially terminal cancer.  I can’t just go about my business as usual.  With every holiday, there is the question of whether it will be the last holiday.  You want to make it especially good but you don’t want to make a big deal out of it.  A big deal means more stress and more stress added to an already stressful situation can cause an explosion or implosion.  And when that happens, it is far from good. 

How do we live our lives like normal, but still embrace the idea that life is short?  None of us are promised more than this next minute.  It is a concept that I have been struggling with for ten months now.  Though I know I look as though I have come a long way, I feel as though I have not made any stride in the right direction.  Perhaps that is because I don’t know which way is the right direction.

From the outside, the caregiver would appear to be the person who brings her to her appointments, makes sure the bills are paid on time, cleans up vomit in a desperate time of need.  I am all those things and so much more.  The caregiver is the person who sees the symptoms in between the good and bad and learns to hone those skills to be able to see a warning sign early on.  The caregiver is the person who cries with her when she receives yet another bad report, laughs with her when she is loopy from medication, prays with her for miracles, prepares for the opposite, yells at her when she needs to take a break, and holds her hand when all is well for a while.  

I searched and searched for some book on the matter.  See, one of the ways that I learn best is by reading.  What does it mean to be a caregiver?  I couldn’t find a good one.  Not one.  I couldn’t find one that wasn’t riddled with terrible clichés meant to work for anyone going through a rough time.  It is because there is no way to put into words all that goes in to caregiving.  It is both the most challenging and best thing I have ever had to do.  Although it has been the hardest thing I have ever experienced, I wouldn’t give up these past few months for the world.  And that, ladies and gentlemen is the true meaning of caregiving.  Speak Life, Choose Joy, Live a life abundant.