Dementia Caregiver Stress: Finding Hope & Future After Caregiving
Are you ready to think about life after caregiving?
Imagine you’re on a never-ending journey, with each day bringing new challenges and uncertainties. This is how many caregivers feel while navigating dementia care.
You might be overwhelmed by the daily tasks—grocery shopping, doctor appointments, and managing the health of your loved one. But have you ever paused to think about your life after caregiving?
In today’s episode, we explore a different perspective: the future beyond caregiving. Let’s break away from the day-to-day grind and reflect on what happens when this chapter of your life ends.
Caregiving is a Season, Not a Life Sentence
While caring for a loved one with dementia feels all-consuming, it’s important to remember that this too is just a season. Seasons change, and so will your role as a caregiver.
Embracing the mindset that this is temporary allows you to think more clearly about the future. What will your life look like when this season ends?
A long-term mindset in caregiving can help you emotionally and physically prepare. It’s crucial to acknowledge that caregiving is not just about the here and now.
Reflect on how your actions today will shape the life you’ll lead once the caregiving chapter closes.
The Silent Toll: Why Self-Care Matters
Did you know that about 30% of caregivers pass away before the person they’re caring for? This staggering statistic highlights the critical importance of self-care.
Many caregivers, out of love and dedication, neglect their own needs, believing they’re the only ones capable of providing care. But what happens when they’re no longer able to help at all?
The cycle of caregiving often continues in families where the next generation becomes responsible. By prioritizing your own health, you break that cycle and ensure a brighter future for everyone involved. Allow others to step in. It’s not selfish—it’s essential.
Read more: How To Transform Dementia Caregiving From Struggle Into Success
The Emotional Marathon of Caregiving
Caregiving is not a sprint. It’s a marathon that requires mental and emotional stamina. Yet, the healthcare system often focuses on teaching physical caregiving skills, leaving caregivers unprepared for the emotional toll. Planning for your future is the key to enduring this marathon.
Ask yourself: What kind of person do you want to be at the end of your caregiving journey? How can you shape your emotional and mental health today so that you emerge stronger and more resilient?
Your Journey Will End—And That’s Okay
Perhaps the hardest truth for caregivers to accept is that one day, this journey will end. But this is not something to fear—it’s something to plan for. Embracing this reality allows you to create moments of joy, even in the midst of caregiving. Life after caregiving isn’t just about survival; it’s about living well again.
Take small steps each day to ensure that when this chapter ends, you are healthy—mentally, physically, and spiritually.
Let’s Break the Cycle Together
Caregiving can feel isolating, but it doesn’t have to. Reflect on the supports you have around you. If you’re feeling alone, consider seeking guidance from a dementia coach or connecting with a support community. The goal is to ensure that your journey is sustainable.
As you continue caring for your loved one, remember to care for yourself.
Ever Wonder How To Know What Is Causing Your Caregiver Stress?
Take Our FREE Caregiver Stress Assessment Today!
https://dignicarebydesign.com/quiz
Are You A Christian Dementia Caregiver Struggling To Cope With Caregiving? Join the FREE “Ask the Dementia Coach” Monthly Meet Up! And be on the podcast, get support and your questions answered.
https://www.dementiacaregivingmadeeasy.com/workshop
Read More:
Talking About Caregiver Burnout With Michelle Gordon
Check the other podcasts: https://dignicarebydesign.com/category/podcast/
Transcript
Welcome to Christian Dementia Caregiving
[0:00] Hey Christian Caregiver, welcome back to Christian Dementia Caregiving, the podcast where I teach Bible-believing Christians how to find real practical help during their dementia caregiving journey but also find hope for the future as we continue to live the day-to-day, make memories and glorify God despite a dementia journey and a dementia diagnosis. And I will tell you that I have had such a wonderful experience as a dementia coach, as a occupational therapist over the 30 plus years I’ve been doing this in truly, truly seeing the blessing that God often gives us as believers in our dementia and dementia caregiving journey. So if you’re here today and you’re struggling, if you’re here today and you feel overwhelmed, if you’re here today and you feel hopeless and helpless, I want you to know a few things. I want you to know that God knows that you’re going through this, that God is here during this dementia caregiving journey and that.
[1:13] You can still navigate this particular season in your life with grace and hope and peace and that you are not alone, dear Christian caregiver. You are not alone. I am excited about today’s episode. It is episode 173, where we’re going to talk about how to embrace your future after dementia caregiving because we focus sometimes so much on the present that we are living in the day-to-day because the day-to-day has its unique struggles and, you know, life. We have to cook, we have to clean, we have to go grocery shopping, we have to go to doctor’s appointments, we have the busyness of life, right? But it’s a time and a season and our lives are full of different times and seasons.
[2:06] And we don’t always stop and think about it while we’re in that particular time and season that it is just that. It is a time and a season. But today we’re going to talk about embracing the future after caregiving. And I really have started to become more and more aware that throughout working with people who are caregivers, like I said a minute ago, we are so focused on the the here and now. We are so focused on the day-to-day. The day-to-day takes over the day-to-day struggles, the day-to-day decisions, the day-to-day interactions that we are experiencing take over our caregiving lives. It takes over our life. And I want you to just think about different times, different seasons in your life where you had to think about your specific future. It could be when you were dating somebody or courting somebody and wanting to explore the possibility of getting married to that person. And you think about your future. You think about where you’re going to live when you’re pregnant. My neighbor right now, beautiful neighbor, is expecting her second baby, right? And been talking about names. We’re looking to the future, what we’re going to name our baby. My husband and I, 30 plus years ago, made a decision to emigrate to the United States. And we had to think through that. What were the possibilities?
[3:35] We had to get a visa. We had to get an airplane ticket. I had to have a work. We needed to know where we were going to live. We didn’t know a lot of these things, but we were looking to the future. Most of our lives, as we are parents, as we’re spouses, as we are living our lives, we are living in the now. But we are living towards a future. The future is coming. Whether we are ready for the future or not, it will eventually be here in a minute from now or a couple of minutes from now or tomorrow.
[4:05] But when we’re navigating dementia and dementia caregiving, we forget to focus on the future. We live in the present. We live in the reality of this is where I am right now, and it is never going to change. It’s always going to be the same. It’s scary and overwhelming and fearful.
Embracing a Future Focus
[4:24] So today’s podcast, we are really going to look at the future, embracing the future. And if you listen to episode 172, I mentioned in that episode, as I’ve been rereading my Bible, how much I’ve recognized that the entire Bible is future-focused. We are to be living a future-focused life, a life of knowing that there is going to be a judgment, there is going to be a future reality of a new heavens and a new earth, that Christ is going to come again, that we live in the here and now, but that at the same time, we are supposed to be living in the future. We’re supposed to be turning away from our sins and repenting and moving forward and away from that that to a better future. And so the first thing I want you to consider today is embracing a longer term mentality of caregiving. And what I mean by that is exactly that. We have to consider the fact that unless the Lord comes again, and unless the Lord takes you before the person that you’re taking care of.
[5:38] You will have a future after being a caregiver. I mention this all the time, you know, when I work with my clients, that as a child, we have an expectation unless something happens outside of the ordinary. As a child, we have an expectation unless something happens out of the ordinary that our parent will pass away before us. As a spouse, when we get married, at some point or another, if you have any wisdom and have thought these things through, you will recognize that there is a very strong likelihood that you are going to outlast your spouse.
[6:20] One of us is going to pass away before the other one, unless something happens and we both pass away in an accident or the Lord comes, one of us is going to remain and the other one will have passed away. And so when we are in our caregiving journey, though, I want us to start to think of a longer term mentality of caregiving. Think about our caregiving journey more in light of being a marathon and not a sprint, right? Did you know that about 30% of caregivers actually die before the person they care for? And that the statistics also show that the emotional burden of being a caregiver is greater than the physical burden of being a caregiver.
[7:03] And that is what the statistics show. But the reality of the healthcare model is that the healthcare model teaches you the physical skills of caregiving. It does not teach you the emotional skills that you need in order to be an effective caregiver. And the emotional skills that you need in order to be an effective caregiver comes from considering the fact that there is a future after caregiving. You have to create a certain way of thinking and being when you are planning for the future. It changes how you act in the present. And so I really want you to think through today and really reflect for yourself as a caregiver, when you get through your caregiving journey, what do you want your caregiving journey to have looked like? What What do you want your future health, your future self to be like? And then what are you going to do? What action are you going to take today to actually start to implement these changes that will make it possible for you as a caregiver to come through this journey in a healthy and healthy way? Holistic fashion. Are you feeling stressed as a Christian dementia caregiver?
[8:18] Let me help. I offer a monthly dementia care audit to one listener of this program to provide you with personalized but evidence-based strategies from a biblical perspective. We only have one session available each month. Don’t miss this opportunity to make your dementia caregiving journey easier.
The Journey of Sanctification
[8:41] Schedule your own dementia care audit today. The second thing I want us to consider as you’re looking at your future after caregiving is that you are in the process of a caregiving journey being sanctified. Sanctification is a process that is ongoing that we need to continue to strive for in order to become more like Christ. And how we respond to adversity, how we respond to a situation is a part of our sanctification journey. For example, for me, my default setting, one of my besetting sins is anger. I am significantly better at maintaining and controlling my anger than I was when I was younger because I’ve been sanctified through this process. But in my sanctification process related to being a dementia caregiver.
[9:39] That default setting that I have specifically is my biggest struggle. And so I constantly have to be aware that I need to not respond in anger when things don’t go my way, that I not respond from a prideful perspective because I didn’t get what I felt like I needed. And so I want you to remember a good and holy God has decreed everything that shall come to pass, absolutely everything. And that despite everything that we feel right now, this process, this caregiving journey that we are on is for our good and for his glory. Which means that when I remember that, not perfectly every single day, but when I remember that this particular struggle, whatever it might be, that I’m experiencing today related to my caregiving, is also for my good and for His glory and for me to become more like Christ. It does remind me not to get as frustrated or as annoyed or as stressed out as I could become. Now, I’m not perfect. I do not do this perfectly. I have to work on this every single day. But this is how we work on being more like Christ, how we become more sanctified. And I want you to consider that are also today, if you are a Christian who does reflect on their own behavior, their own situation.
[11:09] Their own experiences, you know that you can transform any experience you have been through by putting on your Christian worldview.
[11:20] Your lens of looking at it from a big picture view, your lens of looking at this from a kingdom perspective and not from a here and now perspective. I will use my experience in boarding school as an example. It is an experience that through the grace of God, by the work of His Spirit, through good counsel and pastors over years, that I was able to transform an extremely difficult and extremely painful and extremely challenging part of my life into a situation that was totally transformed, has lost the power over me because I recognize that the Lord gave me that particular experience for my good and for His glory. And now I use that particular experience for His good and for my good and for His glory. I talk about it. I’m not at all traumatized by it anymore because I took that experience and I put God’s lens on it, not my lens on it. And because of that, I’m able to glorify God through the fact that I was in boarding school. The exact same thing is what you can do related to dementia and dementia caregiving. Look at this from a kingdom perspective.
[12:44] What are you supposed to learn? What are other people supposed to learn by watching how you navigate your caregiving journey? What are you supposed to learn about the person that you love and care for? What are you supposed to learn about God? What are you supposed to learn about His faithfulness, His mercy, His grace, His truth? What are you supposed to take from this personal experience and transform it into something that is God-honoring and God-glorifying? And only you and only you can answer that for you. But understanding that sanctification occurs through our caregiving journey,
Understanding the Temporary Nature of Caregiving
[13:25] and it is a wonderful way to grow closer to Christ through our sanctification in this process. The third thing I wanted to mention today briefly is that most things in our life, you know, there’s the saying, this too shall pass.
[13:41] And as hard a conversation as this is, this caregiving journey shall also pass away. The whole experience will be behind you at some point or another. The reality of the matter is that one of the reasons I believe it’s harder for people is because it’s an open-ended, we do not know how long it’s going to take. When you are pregnant and you’re miserable, you know that pregnancy is going to end and you have an end date, which makes it easier for you to navigate because you know when it’s going to stop. Your caregiving journey is an open-ended journey. It’s like our life journey, right? We do not know when it is going to end. And that is something that oftentimes makes it harder for us because we are so focused on the here and now. We’re so focused on the day-to-day and it’s being in the trenches and the day-to-day stuff that make it so very difficult at times for us to do. But when you look at it from a perspective of understanding at some point or another, this journey is going to end. And what can you, in the meantime, take from this journey and still create moments of joy, still create a healthy environment, cultivate healthy relationships.
[14:57] Even though they look different? So I want you to consider, I want you to remember, that this journey is going to end. There is an end after caregiving. It ends at some point or another, whether it be because I’ve gone on to glory or whether it be because the person I’m caring has passed away means at some point or another, this journey will end. It’s a hard conversation to have with people because we do not like to think in those terms, but I want you to have a future focus, which means you need
Breaking the Cycle of Caregiving
[15:26] to consider what your life will look like after being a caregiver. And then the fourth thing that I really want us to just touch on very briefly today is that this can become a vicious cycle. If you don’t step in and stop the cycle as a caregiver, the caregiving cycle can turn into a very negative cycle for people. Certain people grow up in households where there’s an abusive relationship, right? Somebody is beating on somebody else and the kids see that and then they beat on their own children and this negative cycle continues, correct? Well, caregiving can have a very negative cycle too. And I’m going to tie it back into the long-term mentality of being a caregiver where 30% of caregivers die before the person that they’re taking care of because they stopped taking care of themselves.
[16:18] What happens, and I’ll just use this as an example, I’ve mentioned this before, I go speak at Alzheimer’s Association sometimes and there was a gentleman taking care of his wife. He did not feel like anybody could take care of her the way he was taking care of her. And so he wouldn’t let his children help, his grandchildren help, nobody is able to help him. But I present to you that if you as the caregiver do not take care of yourself and you actually pass away before the person you’re taking care of, you’re actually precipitating and continuing this negative cycle because now you have inadvertently put your children or grandchildren into the exact same situation where they will then stop taking care of themselves to take care of the person that you were taking care of because you didn’t take care of yourself and you’ve passed away.
[17:10] And then we just continue the cycle. As a caregiver, it is not selfish to take care of yourself. You have to take care of yourself and you have to look towards your future. And we need to really consider how can we change this cycle so that it doesn’t
Taking Action for a Healthier Future
[17:28] become a self-perpetuating cycle for our children and our children’s children after us. So I hope you’ve enjoyed today’s episode. It’s a little bit different. I really do want us to consider what our future looks like. I’m I’m not infallible. I definitely make mistakes related to this. But, you know, one change every day, take an action, continue to strive towards a better, healthier lifestyle as a caregiver. Put supports and structures in place around you. If you haven’t yet considered joining me for a one-on-one call where I will actually work with you in a 20 to 30-minute coaching opportunity that becomes a part of this podcast, you’re welcome to sign up for one of those. I’m trying to do one a month. So far, it has been a little slow on people taking me up on this offer. I do want to gift this to you. So if you are open to having a 20 to 30 minute conversation specifically about how we can make your own dementia caregiving journey easier.
[18:33] Message me the word audit, A-U-D-I-T, audit on Facebook or Messenger, or use the link in the show notes below to sign up for one of these one-on-one 20 to 30-minute coaching opportunities where I promise you, you will walk away with actionable strategies in order to help you become a more future-focused caregiver. And I remind you to keep your eyes on Christ in this journey. And remember, this is for your sanctification and for God’s glory and we can do this together. And as I end all of my podcasts, may the Lord bless you and keep you and I will see you in our next episode.
