My Journey With Health And Fitness – National Caregiver Day

Finally, after 10 days of my sleep score being poor to fair I apparently got a good night sleep. This is almost normal for me as I go through what seems to be manic cycles of insomnia until I think I reach the point of exhaustion when I finally get some sleep. This had been a longer stretch than normal and I have realized it is getting worse again. I’ve decided to give myself until I get back from spending May at the condo and if it is not better by then I will have to go back on sleeping pills. My rationale is if I can’t sleep when I should be at my most relaxed then help is obviously needed.

I found out today is National Caregiver Day which occurs the first Tuesday in April (note April is also Parkinson’s awareness month). As you know every other Tuesday I facilitate a Caregivers’ Support Group which happens to be today so I think talking about caregivers is a perfect fit for this blog. And learning about today has me thinking of handling the group quite differently today.

If you have ever been a caregiver for someone with serious health issues you know that caregivers are unsung heroes. Unfortunately the way our current health system operates the expectation is that family will do much of the heavy lifting when it comes to taking care of loved ones. I have learned a lot from the group I facilitate including the untold emotional cost of basically sacrificing your own life to take care of someone pretty much 24/7. Some feel they just can’t seek long term care for their loved one whether that be because of emotional ties or maybe more distressing due to financial reasons. Others (often times when dealing with aging parents) feel a tremendous amount of guilt about placing their loved one in care. All of them though to me demonstrate an incredible amount of courage to do what they do every day.

When I realized the importance of today I decided I am going to need to change my group up a bit today. Usually everyone gets a chance to do an introduction and explain what they are experiencing which often turns into an emotional unloading of what they have been experiencing. There is often a lot of tears shed during the session though sometimes we have had some laughter too. I thought today I am going to make this a happy session. I’ve already reached out to the sponsoring organization to see if we have some swag we can give all of the participants as a recognition of what they do. I also want today to be about happy stories so that hopefully everyone can walk away from today feeling just a little lighter for a little while.

So if you know someone who is a caregiver do me a favour and reach out to them today. If you can, give them a little gift or take them a coffee. Just let them know you recognize how brave and strong they are.