Daily Devotions for Caregivers

It's easy to get lost in the shuffle of caregiving, isn't it? There are so many  tasks required to take care of someone else that we can forget to take care of ourselves. Aides, doctors, nurses and other professionals focus on our loved ones, and they should. But we can slowly slide back out of view and be nearly forgotten. It's easy to feel insignificant and small in the scheme of things. There have been times since I became a caregiver that I would go days without talking to another person. Perhaps this is due to the age of technology. I might text with someone or "chat" via a social media outlet; but I've literally gone days without speaking to someone. Sometimes I miss the art of conversation. I want to hear someone laugh not just type "lol." We need to hear inflections in their voice and see facial expressions. When we don't, we can begin to feel so very alone and wonder if anyone cares, if anyone sees; or if anyone even thinks about us at...

When my son was first injured and we were living in the hospital, I knew I had to find a way to get adequate exercise so I took up running. I thought it was an inexpensive sport that I could virtually do anywhere. It's been sort of a lifeline for me over the years. Running has become what I do  to deal with the difficulty of caregiving. It helps me physically but it also helps me beat depression and clears my brain. It's really about the only thing I do, and the only reason I get out.  Yesterday, I ran my 16th half marathon. I proudly added my finisher's medal to my overloaded rack on the wall. But I had something happen during my race that had to do with caregiving. As I neared mile 5 of the course there was a drumline playing. It totally caught me off guard. My son was the drum caption and the center snare for his college drumline before his accident. Seeing a drumline live brought back a flood of memories and I collapsed in tears. Eventually, I gathered myself and cont...

It can be very easy to slip into oblivion...I mean, who would know? Fighting with thoughts like this can be a daily struggle for caregivers. There's the aloneness that cannot really be described to those who do not understand. Besides the depression that can try to take hold there's a sense of barrenness that has to be fought...and it is indeed a fight of faith for many.  Our trouble with thinking we are spiritually barren is tied up in the church's perception of fruit. Organized religion says that our fruit are all those things that we are doing inside the church. They consider teaching Sunday School, leading worship, helping with the church yard or cleaning the church to be fruit. Never mind that Jesus talked about none of these things when He talked about the sheep in Matthew 25. His sheep will visit the sick, and visit the prisoner, along with feeding the hungry. He didn't say that they attended Sunday School or Wednesday night Discipleship classes, did He?  ...

By the time you actually become a caregiver there's already been some sort of big ordeal in your life. You're not going to wake up in the morning and say, "I'm a caregiver now." Some series of events had to have happened that placed you in the position to chose it. Something, sometime had to of broken your heart...for each of us although the journey is similar - they are all uniquely different at the same time. No matter what catapulted us to the place of caregiving, i t had to hurt. And many times caregiving bears with it a hurt that does not go away...it's a living pain so deep it cannot be explained. No one can really understand it. No one can fix it. No one can make it go away...it's just there underneath the surface. The pain of being a caregiver is many faceted...because somewhere in the mix we lost our own lives in the shuffle. Psalm 34:18 says this to us today The Lord is near the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit. Today,...

Psalm 139 is a greatly used psalm, but we mostly use it to tell our children how special they are to God. So special of course that they were wonderfully made, and how God was watching and supervising their growth in the womb. However, this psalm is for adults too! God did not abandon us when we got older did He? The Psalm begins with out intimately acquainted God is with our ways. Some days, honestly, that seems a little intrusive, don't you think? It can be scary to think that He knows our thoughts even before they are formed! He knows our thoughts, our words, our works and even our every movement! Now the point is of course, not that God is watching over us to whop us if we make a wrong move; it's more that He is so deeply concerned about us that He is constantly keeping a watch on our soul. In a time in our lives (as caregivers)when we can feel so very abandoned and alone...He is still watching. Maybe we do not understand where everyone went. When tragedy first stri...

This morning I was researching a topic when my devotions led me to Luke 1. One little phrase caught my attention; it had to do with Elizabeth. She was older and barren but the scripture says that she and Zechariah were both righteous before God. (v 6 ESV) That's an interesting point in itself as many probably thought it was God's judgment that didn't allow them to have children. That's just the way it was back then. If you had children you were blessed and if not then you were cursed, at least that's the way the culture leaned. So that's point number one. Many people think because something we deem as bad has happened to us that it is God's way of cursing us. There can even be accusations from "Christians" to the extent that they say we are in sin since God didn't protect us from something terrible happening to us. Elizabeth was barren - but she was righteous ! Just because we cannot live our lives like the "rest of the world" do...