Four Ways to Keep Yourself on Target with Caregiving

Caregiving requires a lot from you as a person. In fact, over time you might find yourself feeling somewhat adrift because you’re lost in all of the many daily tasks involved in caregiving. When you get a handle on some of the ways you can keep yourself heading toward your ultimate goal, that feeling of being adrift fades.

Home Care Services Hawthorne NJ - Four Ways to Keep Yourself on Target with Caregiving

Home Care Services Hawthorne NJ – Four Ways to Keep Yourself on Target with Caregiving

Find a Way that’s Easy to Check in with Yourself

Checking in with yourself might sound a bit vague and possibly a little woo woo, but it doesn’t have to be either. When you check on your senior and how she’s doing, you get an overall impression of how she’s doing and what’s going well for her. You need to do the same for yourself, but perhaps in a slightly different way. Ask yourself about the basics periodically throughout the day, like whether you’re thirsty, hungry, or tired. But you can go deeper and keep a journal. That allows you to see a little more about what’s going on with you.

Reach out to Friends and Family More Often

It’s isolating to be deeply involved in caregiving. When your senior’s needs are all-consuming, there’s often not a lot of time or energy left over for other things. This includes relationships with other people that you love. Start trying now to make a little more time to send text message and make calls. If that’s not possible due to time zone differences, use email. Whatever tools you can use that allow you to keep in touch are important to lean on right now.

Hire Some Help So You Can Make Some Changes

You might think it sounds amusing to do all this checking in with yourself and finding time to talk to friends and family. You need to make room for those changes and one of the easiest ways to do that as a caregiver is to hire home care services providers. Home care services providers can take over some of those repetitive, mundane tasks that tend to wear you down. Just as having their help allows your senior to conserve her energy, you’re conserving energy and time as well.

Do What You Can to Stay Positive

It might be tough sometimes for you to keep a positive attitude about your experiences as a caregiver. There’s a lot that contributes to that issue for caregivers and it’s not always easy to work against those factors. Try to narrow down what it is that keeps you from feeling as positive as possible so you can make changes. This is also where journaling can help.

If you’re running on autopilot constantly, it’s difficult to see where little changes could make caregiving easier on you. It’s also important to stay in touch with yourself so that you’re in a better position to notice changes in your senior’s needs.

If you or a senior family member are considering hiring Home Care Services in Hawthorne NJ, please contact the caring staff at Caring Solutions Home Care LLC. In-home senior care servicing Bergen & Passaic Counties. Call today at (973) 427-3553.

Pamela DelColle, RN, CCRN