Respite Caregiver
Shut Up & Dance |
Respite Caregiver Learns to Shut Up & Dance |
Dance like Nobody's Watching
Sometimes being a caregiver or health care professional can leave you feeling somewhat responsible for helping your loved one or patient. This can lead to feelings of guilt or shame on an unconscious level for not being good enough. I’ve met some people in this situation that had no idea they were even feeling guilt about not being able to help others in a way they wanted to. That led them to dropping the ball and then everyone suffered just a little more.
I have personally been in situations that seemed like they were impossible to get through. My family member was smoking heavy drugs in the house and dening it. Everyone in the house was in danger. Being high myself and feeling out of control is story for another time. There are all kinds of supports that you can set up for yourself before you are in the desperate state of needing it.
First thing I want to share with you is that it is not your job to make others happy or to feel better. We can guide people on a path to wellness and self love, however, each individual is solely responsible for their own mind, body and soul. You need to know that you are amazing. You need to feel that awesomeness right into the core of your being. We are all survivors of life, birth brought us into this world and we have learned many different coping mechanisms and studied many different tools to help us carry on.
Shut up and dance was something I learned during my journey of becoming a caregiver expert; solutions can come in many different forms. Relationships are like a dance. Who leads during the dance can change, how many are dancing together can change. It’s even OK to step on each other's toes once in a while, shit happens. Your dance with the ones you love can last for eternity, making the best of today is what we work on in the now. Staying calm in your moments no matter what happens in your outside environment is something you can practice and master. Your outside environment includes the behavior of those around us. Keep calm and love thy self.
Knowing the difference of being a ‘fixer’ or a ‘supporter’ is something I discuss when I work one on one with clients. Here are some questions you might want to ask yourself to better understand where you’re at with your reality.
Are you always interfering or being invited to help others?
Do you keep secrets to protect others?
Have you recognized feelings of anger or resentment towards others?
How does it make you feel to think that you could be making things worse in the long run by ‘helping’ the way to run to rescue others all the time?
Becoming aware of supporting others instead of fixing others can make the difference between a speedy recovery and a broken wreck. Like if the engine light comes on in your car. You can ignore it and your car can still run but eventually it will break down. Supporting others can seem uncomfortable at first but you will soon start seeing results. By supporting others you are teaching them to fish and be able to provide for themselves rather than cooking them a meal because they are hungry.
While learning how to support someone instead of fixing them you will watch them fall. You will also see them get back up. You may have anger directed towards you for allowing them to fall. Here is where YOUR support system comes into play. If they are not going to die from the fall then they will learn from it. It is ok to protect or ‘fix’ for safety reasons. Most of the time, things are not as bad as our mind would have us believe.
In the beginning when you are making the choice yourself to actually help them instead of save them you may have feelings of resentment and anger build up towards you. This is a time for you to internalize all you have been learning about self care. Keep your self respect, honesty and dignity. Choose your words and moments to express the situation from your perspective. Without blaming or dismissing their feelings your honesty and sticking to the facts will help. You can state a fact about how things make you feel but be careful not to make those statements come across condescending and clarify that it isn’t them that is causing your feelings but their behavior (which is often the case).
Step back for a moment and do some deep digging into the core of who you are and ask yourself what do you get out of fixing others. Do you do this in all of your relationships or only those closest to you? I mean if the receptionist at the doctor's office or even the doctor opens up to you at all what feelings are triggered inside of you? Are you able to just listen and not comment? Did you know that being able to sit silently is sometimes all someone needs for support at times?
Practicing being a good listener and feeling comfortable in silence are some of those tools I talked about earlier. Repeating back to someone what they just told you and including “so do I understand you that…” without including your feelings or your ideas around their situation is an example of how to be a good listener. For the “Fixers” this is hard to do but can get easier with practice.
Ready for some painful truth! Saving someone, coming to their rescue or fixing them is as much about YOU as it is them. You don’t want to feel bad. Ready for some Hope! You can practice feeling elevated emotions (by making a conscious choice to feel happy) until happy becomes your go to feeling. On some level you already know that things can be better and that’s why you’ve gotten this far into reading my stuff here.
Plug in the tunes. Play different genres and notice how it changes the vibes in the room. Find the one that works best for you and find a genre that you can dance well with others with. Control the ouch when you have your toes stepped on and with honesty and respect apologize if you step on others’ toes.
Shut Up & Dance is just one tool you can use to create the life your heart desires!
I like to use Bose speakers for great sound around the house or the yard! But I also use sound canceling headphones if my environment is spiraling out of control.
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