Members article
By Jane Verity ©dementiacareinternational.com
Nine Fantastic Tips for Home Carers to Thrive!
One of the greatest gifts we can give to those we support and care for who have dementia is to reinvigorate and keep our own spark kindled so that we can pass on our joy and enthusiasm to them as well as providing emotional and physical care. Through the Spark of Life Philosophy, we aim to inspire and encourage hope to enable the experience of supporting someone with dementia to be the absolute best possible.
As the Supportive Partner, you need energy as well as patience. Knowing how to take good care of yourself is absolutely vital to the well-being of both you and anyone in your care.
Here are 9 valuable tips to ignite and rekindle your spark:
1. Let Go of Old Conflicts
These can only stand in the way of you having a fruitful relationship. They wear you down and prevent you from focusing on what is good in the relationship. By letting go, you will be able to move on and see new possibilities in the situation so that you can create a positive relationship where you can find magic moments.
Focus on the here and now; on the person and all that is going well; on all that you can do together and achieve now. Look past the symptoms of dementia into the essence of the person, to the spirit that still lives inside.
Remember, the first thing we learn as babies is to smile and today we know that we ‘un-learn’ in opposite order to how we learn. This means that the last thing we lose is the ability to smile. Even a person who has had a cerebral haemorrhage or Parkinson’s disease and is not capable of showing any facial expressions can still smile brightly with the eyes.
You are capable of creating magic moments, no matter what the level of a person’s dementia. Look deeply into each other’s eyes and give your brightest smile. There is a very good chance that you will receive one of equal brilliance in return. Smiling and laughing together are two of the most wonderful and rewarding experiences we can enjoy in our relationships with people who have dementia.
2. Make Time for Yourself
You need time to be able to recharge your batteries. When you are the Supportive Partner of someone with dementia, you know that the person can make heavy demands on your time and energy. You will need to have “time out” to refresh your energy levels and rekindle your spark of life.
But how do you rekindle your own spark? …Be kind to yourself!
The first step is to allow yourself to put yourself first. Only then can you fully take advantage of your time out in such a way to enable you to return with renewed energy and more to give the person that you love.
Sometimes, when I talk with Supportive Partners about this subject, they say. ‘But I feel so guilty. … so selfish if I do it. I can’t allow myself.’ If this is how you feel, perhaps you need to think of this time in a different way – say, as an investment. If you invest in recharging your batteries, you will have more to give.
If you don’t make this investment, you will end up becoming very tired, irritable and, maybe, even angry. You may eventually find it all too hard and give up. This is no good for you and certainly not for the person with dementia. If something happens to you, who will be there for them?
How can you get time out? Perhaps you could call on family members, neighbours or friends. Or, you could phone your local council, or a charity organisation to help you out once in a while. The Federal Government initiatives of Home and Community Care (HACC) and Flexible Care assist with various support services to enable elderly people to continue living independently in their own homes. Respite Care is also available to give home carers a break, timeout to travel or recharge their spark.
The second step is to imagine how you can use your time out in the best possible way. Before you get up in the morning you need to think about the day ahead, what you will be doing, and what it will feel like to do it. Remember to only plan things that will give you pleasure.
The third step is to do something that really stimulates your senses and renews your spirit. Begin your time out by playing your favourite music, and singing at the top of your voice while dancing around the room. Let your mind and body go and allow yourself to enjoy the moment. This will set you up for a good start and help you to get the most out of the activities you have planned.
3. Throw Out any ‘Doom & Gloom’ Information You Have About Dementia
This serves absolutely no positive purpose. It will only make you feel drained and hold your focus on the negatives. You need all your energy to focus on positives and all that can be achieved.
4. Make a Sunshine Book
Use an exercise book to write down all the things that work. Once you have tried different activities and found something that really works well, write it down. Also, record the steps or way you did it that made it work.
Then, on a day when you are really tired or lack imagination or inspiration, you can refer to your Sunshine book to gather new ideas and motivation. Bear in mind that what works on one day, may not work the next. Success is all about trial and error.
5. Acknowledge Your Limits
You know within yourself when you’ve had enough and have reached your limit. It’s extremely important to acknowledge this. Don’t push yourself any further and, at this point, ask for help. Whether you seek assistance from your personal network, or telephone one of the many professional services out there to help, it doesn’t matter – just as long as you get help.
6. Accept the Feelings You May Experience
Sometimes these feelings can be quite unexpected. You might feel angry because you have not been appreciated for all the work you are putting in, or angry about friends who suddenly disappear and are no longer around when you really need them.
You might feel disgust at things the person who has dementia is suddenly saying or doing that they would never have done before. Perhaps you feel guilty for something you said or did, or didn’t say or do?
You might feel lonely. Not everyone can easily understand what you are going through. You may have many other underlying feelings that you don’t even realise you are experiencing, but these are very real and a natural response to all that is going on in your life. My best advice is to simply accept such feelings – they are a part of you.
Most importantly, forgive yourself. You are human. If you experience a great deal of stress, or are tired and reach the point where you’ve had enough, remember that it’s only natural that you feel this way. Ask for help.
7. Share Your Feelings With Others
Do you have a close friend? Is there a family member with whom you can share your feelings? If you don’t have anyone to talk to, maybe you can write down your feelings. Sometimes, this can be extremely cathartic and helpful in freeing one’s emotions. When you write down your feelings, imagine that you are talking to a good friend – this seems to encourage the flow of feelings.
8. Let the Person Know How You Feel
This is one of the things that worked very well for me in supporting my Mum. Sometimes, when I felt really pushed and that she asked more of me than I could possibly, humanly, give, I reached the point where I simply could not give any more. This made me feel really desperate and in need of a good cry.
Sometimes, when I reached this breaking point, I did cry. My tears seemed to touch something deep inside Mum and they brought out her motherly love and need to care for me again. Usually she was not even aware that she had been having such an impact on me. Once she realised, she changed her behaviour.
The lesson for me was that when I shared my feelings honestly with her, it actually had a positive impact on both of us.
9. Trust in Your Own Wisdom & Intuition
This is especially important when you have a professional coming into your home. They will only know the situation from what they see in that half-hour, hour, or few visits. You, on the other hand, know the person well, understand the everyday situation and yourself. It is vitally important if your ‘gut’, feeling or belief is that something being said or suggested is right or not right that you say so, and that you stand up for your beliefs.
So often, I talk with Supportive Partners who say to me that they felt in their hearts that the decision made was wrong. However, they kept telling themselves that the professionals must know best. In hindsight, these people really regretted that they didn’t trust their intuition and stand firm, because it often turned out that they were right.
Here are a few suggestions to help you work constructively with professionals:
- Before the meeting, prepare a list of all your questions.
- Ensure that you get all of these answered in a way that you can understand.
- Have a writing pad with you and write down the answers because afterwards it can be so difficult to remember all that was said. It may help to have a third person, friend or family member attend to take notes.
If you don’t understand anything that is being said, ask for it to be explained again in a different way. If you still don’t understand, that’s okay. Ask for the explanation to be written down because this may encourage the points to made more clearly. Once again, trust your own intuitive wisdom and stand up for your ‘gut’ feelings and what you believe in.