The Role of CareGiving

Supposing the role of a caregiver for your parents only entailed helping with the filling out of paper work, or washing the dishes, the task would be much easier to take on. In such a situation, even if there may be a lot of stuff to do, the issue of burn out will not be a matter for consideration. However, the actual strain arises from the toll the role of care giving takes on not only your emotions but on those of your parents as well. Since all that you do and the time you expend on your parents can be viewed as a great favor, the element of guilt dogs the relationship.

A senior citizen could easily feel guilty for having to ask you to care for them. Strangely in most instances they do not even ask. It is often the case that when you saw that their retired lives were in a state of upheaval and needed to be organized you just stepped in. however often the senior is hounded with feelings of guilt because of the time spent on them, and the attentions you give them unpaid and without thanks.

It is also a negative factor that it is at this exact juncture that the parent has made the transition from being am independent entity to a person requiring assisted care, which causes the senior to lose his self esteem tremendously. Areas of their lives which have been constant for decades suddenly now have changed. If within a year your parents have had to lose their own home, go and live in assisted care, lose their mobility by not being able to drive themselves around, and also lose their independence to have things done for them, they battle with many negative emotions. Guilt is one of them.

Often guilt also follows you, the caregiver, where you feel there's always more you could do for your parents. It's compounded by the senior you are doing your best t care for makes you feel even guiltier by grumbling that they wish you didn't have to go back home or just complaining altogether and making themselves angry.

So how do you combat guilt? Since it doesn't help the quality of living for either the caregiver or the senior, not improve the relationship, it is best to do whatever possible to eliminate guilt from the equation.

One of the best strategies would probably be to sit with your parents and confront them with the issue directly. They are not to blame foe getting old, and should not be feeling guilty for needing your care. After all they did the same for you over several decades as you were growing from childhood into adulthood.

When you break the back of guilt by addressing it and confronting it, your chances of a much better relationship with your parents, increase. In such a case you become no longer combatants but a team that works together in care giving.