The Care The Caregiver Needs

If you take care of a person with a degenerative or chronic disease, either as a job or because they are a loved one, I wanted to tell you first that you do a very important job. Essential and there are few people who do essential tasks. What you do, day after day, has immense value.

Your work is usually deaf and blind, because it is neither seen nor heard. Only you know what it means because only you are always there. This article is for you, so that you feel comforted. In addition, we want to tell you little things that can help you take care of yourself; Only by taking care of yourself can you take better care of yourself.

You have to take care of yourself in two ways: body and mind. If you let yourself go or if you try to give it your all and forget about yourself, you will probably soon fall ill. Do not reach your limit, because it does not warn and the cliff is on the other side. 

I know it seems that you do many times and that these are useless, because there is no improvement. The disease stops or continues its relentless march. Like a rock that little by little comes over you and you add more and more and more effort because it seems that there is little left for it to fall on the other side. But it’s not like that.

You are in a long-distance race with many kilometers, with a lot of time and a lot of life at stake. Do not give everything for a kilometer, the goal is to keep running and adding. People who run marathons know their pace, they have set a limit and they know that if they exceed it, their overall performance will be much worse.

You work with a person. Enjoy and learn with it. He probably wants to do something for you too. The feeling of constantly receiving and not giving is not pleasant and often causes guilt. On the other hand, the time you share is also the time of your lives.

How can you take care of yourself?

There is a world of possibilities that are open to you:

Lean on the network of services offered by Health. Among the services for patients and caregivers of chronic and degenerative diseases are:

• The Centers and Associations. The Reina Sofía Foundation Alzheimer Center, the Spanish Confederation of relatives of Alzheimer’s patients and other dementias (CEAFA), the Tutelage Foundations of People with Associated Mental Illness (FUTUPEMA) or the Spanish Confederation of family groups and people with mental illness (FEAFES) They have very good websites to inform you of everything you want to know about chronic and degenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, multiple sclerosis, etc.

• The home help service. In many cases, Public Health offers the possibility of offering help to the caregiver of a person with a chronic and degenerative disease. It’s a great way for you to take a break and feel like you have additional support.

• The Day Centers. They can help you to be in contact with other people who are living the same as you and on the other hand help the patient to slow down the disease to communicate with other patients who have the same doubts and uncertainties etc.

• Residences for the Elderly specialized in people with degenerative diseases.

• Training Programs. The more informed you are, the more you will know about the disease, and you will know how to help your loved one and how to help yourself.

• The Mutual Help Groups (GAM). THE GAM is based on “We share the same problem so when I help the other I help myself “.

• Psychotherapy. Group therapy has been shown to be working very well. Sharing our feelings with other people who suffer the same with us helps us and makes us feel that we are not the only ones and that we are not alone. It is also very important to learn that “total self-sacrifice” does not make sense. That taking care of ourselves is important and that is not why we are worse people.

Other recommendations that we give you at a general level are:

• Exercise. It’s not about beating yourself up every day but about breathing, going out into the open and stretching. We are beings that are designed to move. Thus, generating movement activates the most pleasant part of our hormonal system.

• Recognize how the problem is affecting you psychologically and how it is getting out of hand. If you don’t feel like going to therapy, the simple fact that chatting with people who are having experiences similar to yours can go a long way.

• Support you in all the people who add, who can contribute both to you and the person you care for.

• Let the person who suffers from a chronic and degenerative disease have independence to carry out activities as far as his case allows. On the one hand we pose a challenge to the sick person and on the other hand we get a physical and mental rest.

From here we give you all the encouragement in the world and we hope we have helped you a little through this article made with all the love in the world just for you.