According to the Family Caregiver Alliance National Center on Caregiving, there are presently 65.7 million caregivers in the U.S. These dedicated individuals are unpaid for their unsung efforts of looking after someone incapable of fully caring for themselves. In The Accidental Caregiver’s Survival Guide: Your Roadmap to Caregiving Without Regret, author A. Michael Bloom, MA., describes the many different types of family caregivers as people caring for life partners/ spouses who become ill or disabled, parents caring for children with disabilities, adult children caring for aging parents, family members caring for an injured veteran who returns from war, or to a loved one who suffers a traumatic brain injury after a car/industrial accident or is the victim of gun violence. Many “sandwich generation” caregivers even perform more than one caregiving role such as providing care to an elderly parent with dementia and to a child with a disability.

“Due to their dedication, limiting beliefs and desire to do it all, many caregivers are highly stressed and on the brink of burnout, which puts their loved ones and themselves at risk of harm,” cautions Bloom, who was the primary, live-in caregiver for his parents during their final years. Today he uses his experience as a coach and supporter of other caregivers and generously shares how to avoid burnout suggestions that are practical, tactical and soul-saving coping strategies for family and professional caregivers.

First, Care for Yourself

Before any airplane leaves the gate, FDA regulations require that a flight attendant talk passengers through a series of emergency instructions—seatbelts, exit doors and oxygen masks that descend when air pressure drops inside the cabin. The first rule is for adults to put on their own oxygen mask before assisting anyone else. Take heed caregivers: this principle—caring for yourself first—applies to you. Such a win-win strategy, when followed, insures that when your needs are met the person you care for will also benefit. Unfortunately, while it is the most important thing to do, it is the least remembered thing on the caregiver’s TO DO list.

In Support for Alzheimer’s and Dementia Caregivers: The Unsung Heroes, Judith L. London Ph.D., a psychologist in San Jose, California, advises that the more than 15 million individuals, who are caregivers for family members or friends with Alzheimer’s disease or other forms of dementia, are themselves the casualties and hidden victims of the disease. “No one sees the sacrifices they make,” she writes. Her cautionary advice—it is vital for caregivers to take care of themselves by exercising, eating and sleeping properly, and getting respite care when needed,” says London.

Caregiving Effects Overall Health and Well-Being

Regardless of age, sex and race and ethnicity, caregivers report problems such as sleep deprivation, poor eating habits, failure to exercise, failure to stay in bed when ill and postponement of or failure to make medical appointments for themselves—proof that their own health and well-being is pushed aside to manage their caregiving responsibilities.

Why Caregivers Put Themselves Last

Marilyn Eppolite, a local intuitive energy therapist, is a good example of a caring daughter—healthy, empathetic and a multi-tasker, proficient at juggling numerous things in her marriage and work—who stepped up to the challenge of caring for her father while he suffered with dementia. “My mother was comfortable leaning on me because of my healing background and empathetic qualities. I often sensed what she needed before she asked. Eventually I had to remind her that she had three other children she could also ask,” says Eppolite, who notes that her mother had difficulty in asking for help. Overall, Eppolite now has a good understanding of how we have been acculturated to assume the A-personality type in a crisis. “When we are thrown into a predicament unexpectedly, we go on automatic pilot, roll up our sleeves and get things done without asking others for help,” she advises.

Even though Eppolite was in good health, she wondered why she was so exhausted. “Like other caregivers, I tended to isolate myself from social interaction because I was too physically and emotionally depleted by dealing with my parents’ issues and my own feelings. It never dawned on me, largely because I didn’t interact and hear the stories of other caregivers, that caretaking was going to be such a difficult job. Looking back, I should have realized that there was no way I could juggle it all alone without personal consequences and that it would have been good to be part of a caregiver’s support group,” comments Eppolite.

From Bloom’s experience in the emotionally wrenching experiences of caregiving, where we often go from crisis to crisis, it’s difficult to let our guard down and see that our parents, who were once vital and cared for us, are aging and unable to fully care for themselves. “In our society, we don’t like looking at these things, which means that we are largely in denial when we are accidentally thrown into the situation. When we allow the truth settle into our psyches, the shock has a huge emotional impact,” he advises.

No Downtime

“Growing up in my household, self-care was not valued. Instead of setting aside important downtime to nurture ourselves, value was placed on ‘giving’,” says Rhonda Clarke, who was involved in the medical caregiving business for 14 years. Now the owner of Yoga for Living, in Cherry Hill, Clarke points out that many parents struggle to model self-care for their children. She muses, “Downtime permits time for self-care and if this is missing from a parent’s actions throughout childhood and adolescence, how would children know what it looks like when they’re an adult. It’s unfortunate, we rarely give ourselves permission to stop and take time to take care of ourselves.”

Clarke’s passion for supporting caregivers is the result of numerous life experiences. “I worked for Bayada Home Care, two of my sisters are nurses and one is an occupational therapist. I was also married to a nurse,” she remarks. Clark is concerned with two themes she sees with her clients in the medical field—caregivers who direct most of their energy outward do not take care of themselves and many caregivers get their sense of self-worth from caregiving. “When caregivers push themselves beyond their boundaries and deplete what they think is a never-ending well of giving, their health can suffer. It’s actually healthier to give, when you give from a place of self-care. Regular yoga and meditation class is an avenue that re-energizes by nurturing the mind and the heart—it fills you up,” explains Clarke.

Self-Renewal and Self-Empowerment Can Be Learned

In her Empowering the Caregiver workshop, certified Body-Psychotherapist Alexander teacher and Gestalt therapist, Ute Arnold enlightens participants regarding how ongoing demands of caring and caretaking create responses of worry and anxiety, until habitual patterns of contractions or pain in the body have become deeply entrenched. “A parent, teacher, nurse, or anyone who has taken the responsibility for another human being is challenged to find or make time for caring and empowering the self because mind and body are on constant alert and have lost neurological pathways to natural relaxation and well being,” says the founder of the nonprofit Unergi School of Body Psychotherapy, which integrates body, mind, emotions, spirit, creativity and nature.

Arnold’s creative one-day workshop introduces caregivers to her Unergi (unity and energy) Holistic Therapy modality that includes healing touch, body dialogue and psychophysical micro-movement to restore and guide sensing, thinking and responding into harmonious balance again. Hope, possibilities and trust in the amazing human organism, and the healing forces of nature, may be the next step for a parent, teacher, nurse, or anyone who lives often in overwhelming circumstances and wants to find a way to expand time in the smallest moments of self-care to in turn become an effective caregiver. “We can all learn how to build a road map to release the hidden power in our healing core-self,” advises Arnold.

TheAccidentalCaregiver.Weebly.com. DrJudithLondon.com, [email protected] Marilyn Eppolite, 856-236-5973, [email protected] Yoga For Living, 1926 Greentree Rd., Cherry Hill. 856-404-7287. YogaForLiving.net. Ute Arnold, 215-297-8190. [email protected], Unergi.com.