Once in a while it would be nice and provide an uplifting state of personal worth to have a family member comment or say "we appreciate the really great job you are doing taking care of family member X or Y". Family members automatically assume you are totally resilient and need no words of encouragement or appreciation from time to time. As a caregiver how, how do you overcome the feelings of resentment for family members who show no appreciation for your efforts?
Sometimes it's because they don't want to see, but other times it's the very human situation that when we haven't experienced something it's hard to really know what someone else is going through. You can try to explain your feelings, but try to let the resentment go by just accepting that this is the case in many, if not most, families. Other caregivers are your best support because the know what it's like.
Blessings,
Carol
I think resentment comes from an unfulfilled expectation. You expect your family to appreciate everything you do and when they don't the resentment sets in. To solve this try to temper your expectations if you can. It'll take work and practice and it will be a process but if expectations can be readjusted that might help the resentment.
Also, you know you're doing a good job for your loved one. You know everything that goes into caring for another person. Pat yourself on the back once in a while. Know that your loved one is in loving and capable hands with you as their caregiver. At the end of each day take a few minutes to stop and think of everything you did for your loved one that day and realize that it's not so important that someone recognized what you did but that your loved one is safe, clean, well fed, comfortable, and content because of you.
Can you get some validation from other sources? I know that prayer and online sites help me. I also find that I get support from NON family members It's amazing that none of my cousins family members on her dad's side have said one word about everything that I do for her. Not one word in 3 years! Not one inquiry about her either! I try to just let it go. I do get comments from doctors, nurses, and the staff at the MC unit about how great it is that she has so much love and support from her cousin. Everyone initially thinks she's my mom. They say they've never had a cousin be a caregiver. Hmmm....
Just know that you are loved and appreciated and that the family members who do not honor that, can't take that away from you.
She has re-written history in her mind and now remembers my brother as a caregiver instead of the leach that he is. She seems to thing that when he was living with her, he took care of her. That is not the case at all. She actually took care of him - physically at first when he came to her with pneumonia and financially for years afterward. She was in much better shape then and was mostly independent.
I would love to hear a thank you from her as I am wiping her butt or changing her soiled sheets or feeding her. That is who I would like some appreciation from. I am the one in the trenches and I still feel like I am a disappointment to her.
(formerly Mom2Mom)
So, I decided to change my attitude. That has been my life preserver. I think all care givers have to learn to change their attitude. That is the key to staying strong and positive during the care giver journey and well after.
I don't know if you have ever read Viktor E. Frankl's book: Man's Search for Meaning. It's a great book on his life in Nazi death camps between 1942 and 1945 and the lessons for spiritual survival. He states there is only one thing that no man can take away from another, and that is "attitude". He proved you can survive the worst of the worst by adjusting his attitude.
I, personally, have found that to be so very true. It's not an easy task, but with time and practice, it is very doable. Good Luck. Take care of yourself.
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