WHAT OTHERS HAVE TO SAY
You should have more to go on than what I say about myself.
If you are deciding whether to bring me into a caregiving situation that affects someone you love, this page gives you evidence beyond my own account of who I am and how I work.
That evidence comes from caregivers who have worked with me, people who have watched me work with caregivers, and churches, ministries, and professional organizations that have trusted me with people they serve.
Some of those conversations are public, so you can listen and form your own judgment.
You do not have to trust me because someone else does.
But you should be able to consider what they have experienced and observed as you decide whether I am someone you would trust with your own caregiving situation.
What caregivers have said after bringing the actual situation into the work
The situations people bring into advising are not always dramatic.
Sometimes several consequential things have to be worked through together. Sometimes something small has happened and they are not sure whether it matters. Sometimes they already know the available options but still have to determine which one actually fits the situation they are living.
What matters is whether the situation can be worked through far enough to understand what it means and what, if anything, needs to happen next.
When the next step becomes clearer
One caregiver came into a conversation with several things changing at once and questions about what could still work, what was no longer realistic, and what needed to happen next.
Near the end of the conversation, she said:
Okay. Okay. Okay. I feel like I’m super equipped. I’m gonna try to call Brookdale now.
— Caregiver in advising
She did not leave with every future question resolved.
She left with enough of the present situation ordered to know what she was going to do next.
When something comes up, you do not have to start over
One caregiver came into a conversation with several things changing at once and questions about what could still work, what was no longer realistic, and what needed to happen next.
Near the end of the conversation, she said:
I think it’s knowing that I’ve got you I can connect with. If something comes up, you know, it’s like you’re my safety net. I’m walking on this tightrope, and you know I have a safety net, and you are it.
— Caregiver in advising
What mattered was not simply knowing that another conversation was available.
When the next question came up, she could bring it to someone who already knew what had happened before and understood the caregiving situation she was talking about.
When your understanding of what is yours to carry changes
One caregiver had once believed that not moving the person he loved into his own home would have been selfish.
Looking back on an early advising conversation, he said:
If you had not had that conversation with me, she’d probably be here right now. In my frame of mind back then, it was very selfish of me not to make that happen. I don’t feel that way anymore.
— Caregiver in advising
The caregiving did not become less important.
What changed was his understanding of what responsibility actually required of him—and what it did not.
When the reasoning begins to stay with you.
After several years of working through changing caregiving situations, one caregiver described the difference this way:
I do hear you in my head. … I don’t have to talk to you to hear you.
— Caregiver in advising
The purpose of advising is not for you to need an advisor to answer every question.
Over time, the reasoning can become more familiar too: what matters, what can wait, what is still working, and when something has changed enough that it needs to be brought back into the advisory relationship.
When the reasoning begins to stay with you.
After several years of working through changing caregiving situations, one caregiver described the difference this way:
I do hear you in my head. … I don’t have to talk to you to hear you.
— Caregiver in advising
The purpose of advising is not for you to need an advisor to answer every question.
Over time, the reasoning can become more familiar too: what matters, what can wait, what is still working, and when something has changed enough that it needs to be brought back into the advisory relationship.
What someone saw when she watched me work with caregivers
Some people have known my work from more than a presentation or a conversation. They have watched me work with caregivers while the actual caregiving was happening.
Kathryn Speer Shoaf, RN, BSN, ATP, owns Elite Cruises and Vacations and leads supported dementia-friendly cruises and caregiver retreats. I first joined her staff for a dementia-friendly caregiver retreat cruise in January 2024, working alongside caregivers, people living with dementia, and other professionals.
After seeing that work firsthand, Kathy wrote:
Lizette is an amazing educator. She has the experience and the skills to realistically provide helpful assistance to caregivers and other professionals.
— Kathryn Speer Shoaf, RN, BSN, ATP
Owner, Elite Cruises and Vacations
Kathy did not know my work only from what I told her about it. She had watched me work with the families she was responsible for serving.
She brought me back, later asked me to serve as a keynote speaker, and continued to involve me in the work.
That matters because caregiving judgment has to work outside a classroom.
The questions are rarely isolated. The people involved do not always see the situation in the same way. And something that sounds straightforward in general may look very different once it has to work for an actual caregiver and family.
Churches and organizations have invited me to serve the people they care for
Some of my work with caregivers has happened because someone else carried responsibility for a congregation, support group, or community and believed what I knew could be useful to the people they served.
At Morningside Baptist Church, I had already worked with members of the congregation before I was invited to teach their broader community about dementia care. When the church announced the event, they told their own people that I had “cared for our own members before” and came highly recommended.
I have also been invited to teach caregivers and families in local church settings including Blue Ridge Presbyterian Church, Buncombe Street Methodist Church, and Hampton Park Baptist Church.
Sometimes that work has involved helping caregivers understand dementia. Sometimes it has involved helping churches think more carefully about what the people living with dementia and the families caring for them actually need.
More recently, Christian ministries have also invited me into longer conversations about caregiving, responsibility, dignity, truth, limits, and faithfulness.
Rather than asking you to take those invitations as proof by themselves, you can listen to some of those conversations yourself.
Hear the reasoning for yourself
You may want to hear more than what other people say about my work.
These conversations give you an opportunity to listen to how I think when caregiving questions involve dignity, responsibility, family relationships, truth, limits, and what faithfulness requires in an actual situation.
You can decide for yourself whether this is the kind of reasoning you would want brought to your own caregiving situation.
Joni and Friends Ministry Podcast
How to Thrive in Dementia Care with Lizette Cloete
Stephanie Daniels and I talked about dignity, difficult family dynamics, telling the truth without deception, caregiver limits, stewardship, and what it means to care faithfully when dementia changes the situation.
The Reformed Deacon
Helping Those Affected by Dementia
David Nakhla and I talked about what deacons and churches need to understand when dementia affects a person, a caregiver, and the wider family—and how the church can care without taking over responsibilities that belong elsewhere.
The Dementia Collective
When Caregiving Becomes Stewardship
Andrew Karesa and I talked about personhood, responsibility, truth, caregiver limits, asking for help, and why Christian caregiving cannot be reduced to keeping someone safe or simply doing more.
The Renton Rathbun Show
You’re Already a Caregiver—You Just Don’t Know It
Renton Rathbun and I to discuss recognizing the hidden demands of caregiving, caregiver exhaustion, and the importance of having support along the way.
The present work has a professional history behind it
Caregiving System Advising is a newer name. The professional work underneath it is not.
Much of my earlier public work was specifically dementia-related. That is where a great deal of this work was being developed, practiced, tested, and refined.
The work is broader now. That history is still part of what stands behind it.
For years, I have been invited to teach other professionals and caregivers about dementia, function, caregiving, and the realities families have to work through outside the treatment room.
PESI has selected me to teach continuing education for healthcare professionals. The South Carolina Alzheimer’s Resource Coordination Center provided grant funding for caregiver-focused work I developed. And I have taught occupational therapy professionals through the South Carolina Occupational Therapy Association.
Those organizations were not endorsing Caregiving System Advising as it is named and described today.
The language and the work have become more precise over time.
What that history does tell you is that the judgment behind the work you are considering now did not begin with this website. It has been developing through years of professional practice, caregiver work, teaching, and having that work examined and used beyond my own practice.
You have more than my word to go on
Everything on this page is still, ultimately, me telling you who I am, how I came to this work, and how I advise. You should not have to rely on my account alone.
There is also evidence outside what I say about myself—through the people and organizations that have invited me to teach, speak, and contribute; through the work others have observed; and through caregivers who have experienced the advising itself. That evidence belongs in its own place.