Life is funny. Sometimes the most rebellious of us, the teen gone bad, the unwed mother of three, the Harley brother in leather and bandanas and lots of tattoos who become the best caregiver, the most thoughtful son–or daughter.
Why? Sometimes those who travel counter to society have the most tender souls. Sometimes the battle with their personal demons have made them even more thoughtful, more real and more alive. They may wrap the package in a prickly covering, but that doesn’t mean there’s not a teddy bear underneath.
Our lives are like boomerangs. For some of us, we fling ourselves as long and as hard as we can from our families–and our trajectory runs its course. We go to the bitter edge, turn, and with the same intensity we find our way back home again.
That doesn’t mean that if you’re the black sheep that you have to cut your hair, cover your tats, and clean up your language in order to be a good caregiver. Be yourself! What a refreshing idea. What you have to give to your loved one–your life experience, your way of looking at the world–is unique and of value.
And if you don’t already know it, black sheep have incredible charisma. It’s your charm, your edginess, your dangerous elements that make you such a great care person.
I do think that most of us get more forgiving as we age. We get tired of being angry at everybody and everything. We get tired of our own spiel. We realize we don’t know everything and all that we’ve been hiding and running from was ironically trying to teach us a thing or two. If your family didn’t used to accept you, it doesn’t mean they still won’t. And if your mom or dad or sister or brother need you, and you need them–be willing to knock on the door.
Alzheimer’s and other diseases that ravage our bodies are great levelers. When it hits and your loved one needs help, it won’t matter if you’re wearing cowboy boots or Birkenstocks. Don’t let others keep you away. Don’t let your past keep you away. You deserve to be there. They deserve to have you there in those final years, months, and hours.
So what if you don’t look like, talk like or think like the other sons and daughters in the waiting room. Maybe that’s a good thing. Some of the kindest, most attentive, most present caregivers I know come in the most unlikely of packages.
Tags: grief, hope
ARE YOU THE UNLIKELY CAREGIVER?
I was indeed the most unlikely of caregiver candidates; Thrice divorced, living out of state, broke as a pauper, stressed to point of heart attack, rebellious, living(out of necessity) in VA housing for the homeless, and forced into early retirement due to health problems, including major depression.
I’ll never forget that day in 2003 when out of the blue I received a call from my younger brother about our mother and the neglect she was suffering under another so-called caregiver. That call and my reaction to it changed lives in my family forever.
Righteous anger exploded from somewhere within me and shocked everyone, including me. With no forethought, I committed immediately to rescuing Mom from a situation that had deteriorated to the point of loneliness where she felt like she had nothing more to liver for. She was 85 yrs old and had given her entire adult life to the raising of 5 children and an alcoholic husband yet she had been placed way across town in Senior Citizen Housing where she lived totally alone. She had given up and only wanted to die if God would take her home.
Being the oldest sibling I, for the first time ever, asserted my seniority by daring to attempt to take on the awesome responsiblity of finding a way to move her from another state some 450 miles away to live with me.
On the surface of it all the arrangement seemed impossible what with my ruined credit rating, no housing or even enough money for the trip. Yet, God had other ideas. With His supernatural workings behind the scene, it all fell into place. Running out of time and being unable to find suitable, affordable apartments, my last application on the list proved to be the one apartment in all of our huge metropolitan area that could work. It did work, and now 3yrs later Mom is happy and as healthy as she can be.
In bringing Mom to this state of happiness I dug into reserves of persistence and intelligence that I never knew I had. She had suffered a major stroke without treatment. This was discovered by the physician we acquired here in her new hometown, along with the diagnosis of severely blocked arteries in her heart. After an ordeal of an angioplasty and the proper drugs she has blossomed. Her heart was only getting about 20 percent of the normal blood supply.
Prior to the angioplasty her weight had ballooned to 200 pounds. It was also discovered that her thyroid was malfunctioning. She is now weighing a steady 160 pounds, walking everyday and looking great. The fancy electric wheelchair that she was in back in her other residence is now collecting dust in my closet.
I say, “Thanks be to God for her recovery, even if it took the love and dedication from the most unlikely of siblings.”
~Ron Knight