Family Caregivers and Health

Family caregivers are affected by physical demand and emotional angst. In order to achieve health and quality of life for self and patient, caregivers need sustenance.

Aside from the concrete demands of caregiving, caregivers must navigate an emotional minefield.

• They must deal with grief, loss and disappointment – their own and that of the patient.
• They can feel total love and complete negativity toward their loved one all at the same time.
• They can become caught up in guilt about being the healthy one, guilt over their negative feelings, guilt if they have any joy while their loved one is suffering, guilt about taking care of themselves when their loved one is worse off.

Members of the mental health profession have been saying for decades that mental and physical health are all tied up and shouldn’t be treated as unrelated entities. Anyone who wasn’t convinced of this before will be, once they see the health statistics on family caregivers.

Those caring for loved ones are roughly twice as likely to experience depression, colds, flu, back injury, cancer and other illnesses. Those caring for someone with dementia are twice again as likely to develop depression. This cannot all be accounted for by physical demand alone.

When a loved one falls ill it is truly a crisis. But if the illness is chronic, caregiving will be a way of life and balance must be achieved, physically and mentally, if the caregiver is to stay well too.

Marathon runners wouldn’t think of running the race without water stops. Caregivers need water. They need things that will rejuvenate, revitalize, replenish some of what is depleted. If health and quality of life are the goals, the caregiver’s water, like the patient’s medicine, is not a luxury, it is a necessity. What kind of water do you need?