Part One of a Three-Part Series

Three months.

That’s how long it’s been since my mom broke her hip after her ill-fated attempt at Olympic stair diving. (The good news is she’s healing beautifully. The judges, however, deducted points for the landing.)

Somewhere during those three months, I convinced myself I was getting my life back.

The mental fog I’d been living in for years had finally started to lift. I was making decisions again instead of putting everything off until tomorrow. My business had my attention instead of whatever crisis might be unfolding in the next room. I wasn’t constantly listening for movement or wondering if I needed to stop what I was doing because Mom needed something. For the first time in a long time, life felt…lighter. I honestly thought I was getting better.

This week, Mom had a dental appointment in Colorado, so we loaded up for the hour-and-a-half drive. This wasn’t just any dentist. He specializes in patients who are terrified of the dentist, which sounded perfect because the last time I tried taking Mom, she cried so hard in the waiting room that I finally looked at her and said, “We’re going home.” There wasn’t a filling in the world worth putting her through that kind of fear.

So imagine my surprise when the dentist smiled and asked if she was doing okay and Mom laughed, and cheerfully announced, “Oh, I’m not afraid of the dentist.”

I just sat there blinking in astonishment. Ma’am…that is the biggest story you’ve told all day.

Apparently dementia has a way of editing out memories you’d just as soon forget. The woman who had been absolutely hysterical at her last appointment had no recollection of it whatsoever. I decided right then that arguing with dementia would be like arguing with Wyoming weather. Nobody wins. The appointment went wonderfully, and we have a plan. Snap!

The drive, however, was another story.

Ninety minutes each way in the car gives you plenty of time to discover there is no perfect volume setting for a 94-year-old. The music was too loud…until it wasn’t loud enough…until it needed to come back up again. I’d ask Mom a question and she’d stare out the window as if I’d never spoken. I’d ask again because I assumed she hadn’t heard me, only to get a sharp answer that caught me completely off guard. Now, if you know my mom, that’s not really who she is.

By late afternoon, we were both tired. We even sniped at each other a little. It wasn’t some dramatic argument. It was simply two women who love each other trying to communicate through hearing loss, memory loss, road noise, fatigue, and years of accumulated caregiving.

It didn’t feel good. By the time I pulled into my driveway, I wasn’t thinking about the dentist anymore. I was mad and I was thinking about us.

What bothered me wasn’t that we’d gotten short with each other. What bothered me was how quickly it had happened. Three months ago, this had been my everyday life. Why did one ordinary day leave me feeling so emotionally drained?

I couldn’t stop thinking about it.

Somewhere between pulling into the garage and getting ready for bed, the answer quietly found me.

I wasn’t reacting to one day. I was reacting to seven years.

That realization has stayed with me all week because, if I’m honest, I’ve spent years believing I simply needed to become a more patient person. Now, anyone who knows me well is probably laughing because they also know I quit praying for patience a long time ago. I’ve read the book of Job. I’ve seen how that particular prayer tends to go, and let’s just say I’ve had enough “character-building opportunities” to last a lifetime.

The more I’ve thought about our day together, though, the more I’ve begun to wonder if I’ve been asking myself the wrong question all these years. Maybe patience was never the issue at all. Maybe there was something else happening that I simply didn’t have words for.

That realization sent me down a rabbit hole of research. What I found surprised me. Researchers at the National Institute on Aging, the Family Caregiver Alliance, and Neal Shah at CareYaya have spent years studying what prolonged caregiving does to our brains. Difficulties with concentration, decision-making, memory, emotional fatigue—even something Shah calls cognitive overload– are all well documented.

For the first time, I realized I wasn’t imagining what I was feeling. There was a reason. I just hadn’t discovered it yet. And I have a feeling it’s going to change the way I look at caregiving…and maybe the way I look at myself.

We’re going to unpack that statement over the next couple of weeks because this is far too important to rush through. I’ve stumbled onto something that has the potential to free a lot of caregivers from carrying guilt they were never meant to carry. And that is BIG!

Get ready, I think this will provide some relief that we all need! I’m not being coy, it’s just a lot to unpack in one sitting. I’m already on it! In the meantime, here’s a small assignment.

Caregiver Hack of the Week

This week, don’t try to fix anything. Don’t promise yourself you’ll be more patient tomorrow. Don’t spend another week criticizing yourself because you lost your cool.

Instead, ask yourself one question.

What if I’ve been asking myself the wrong question?

Don’t answer it today. Just sit with it for a few days.

Sometimes the questions that change our lives aren’t the ones we answer immediately. They’re the ones that quietly stay with us until we’re finally ready to see ourselves differently.

---

Sources: National Institute on Aging (NIA); Family Caregiver Alliance; Neal Shah, CareYaya, on cognitive overload and prolonged caregiver stress.