Have you seen "On the Basis of Sex..."?  The thing is...it all started with a caregiver.

It's a well done movie–relevant recent history about gender equality. But the thing is...the revolution started with a caregiver.  A good son was caregiving his mother and he got slammed by the IRS saying THAT deduction was only for men.

Ruth Bader Ginsberg and the ACLU found it to be a perfect test case to start challenging all the laws that we now take for granted.  All of you caregivers out there will relate to this poor guy's daily grind. Mom in a chair, dementia eating away at her, him stuck in the chaos and he's got another battle with the IRS.

Go see the movie.  It is an important and healthy distraction...while you do it...remember what you are doing matters. 

I have started a daily practice of gathering serendipitous wisdom from the day.  I have a plan to create something more public–perhaps a video or audio daily live chat called "The Good Enough Daily". It is on a long list of possibles: TBD.

But until then, let me tell you about them on the hopes that it may inspire you to do the same. Here are some I use...there are so many card decks out there...

• (various) Unity's card decks - link Amazon
  
• Louise Hay's Power Thought Cards - link Amazon
• Cheryl Richardson's Grace Cards - link Amazon
• Self Care Cards - link Amazon

I draw cards as part of my waking up process...usually with coffee.  They are part of my own spiritual practices each day to help me taking care of myself...and keep my inner balance as I take care of many each day as a hospice chaplain.

This is also for the fifteen MILLION unpaid caregivers who are doing the daily, chaotic work of caring for their infirm loved ones.

Much like my weekly sound meditations in San Francisco, I listen for what is 'in the room'.  There I ask people to <quickly> check in:

• How was your week? Your day?
• What came up for you? What is troubling you? Sticking to you?
• Any celebratory events or challenges?

Then I paint the watercolor of what the sound, silence and poetry might be of support to those and what is 'in the room'.

It's a form of meditative improv in service of love. So is drawing cards every morning.

Improv 'What is" is one of the rules in the Fieldguide. Any of its many forms of implementation is a good practice for me. You see my (prairie, bootstrapped) inclination is to want to get 'it' perfect and over prepare for whatever... 

Life is not that way. All I (and you) have to do is show up knowing we are enough...and worthy to be participating in what is in front of us.  Then we do the best we are able. Both (preaching) ministers at my Unity Church in San Francisco are stellar at improv on the stage...but for me it is a learning edge.

Because we all have our edges.  At last Sunday's meditation, several people spoke about the edge between what shows up in the world and what shows up inside us...and then there is the pause.  This is the place of choice...do we choose to react, respond? Are we triggered?  Are we needing to be right?  This is the same edge for us all.

Reading the Day
It is in same way that I draw several cards from my various (and lovely) spiritual card decks each morning and take a moment (but not too many moments...) to see if there a pattern to the cards drawn.   I then read this wisdom and speak about it for eight minutes, because who has a lot of time in the mornings?

...and I have theme music, too.  "Good Enough" by Karen Drucker.  She is awesome, if you are not familiar with her as both a songwriter and a performer.  Check out her song if you want a lift to your day.

I am preparing a collaborative series of presentations around my new book and working with a dear friend to accomplish it.  It is great (chaplain) fun to find common ground between the sacred wisdoms and with the highly actionable nature of neuroscience research. 

Heart and head are powerful partners which change the planet...and certainly our lives.

This day long symposium is on resiliency in nursing.
These beautiful professional caregivers experience much of the same stress symptoms as their unpaid sisters and brothers on the front lines of love.  But the opportunity to work with a true friend when doing this work (that matters...) is an exceptional thing.

My father was a wise man: John W. Hager
He is gone from this earth and has been for decades, but his words are alive in me. His saying about the quantity (of friends) that make one's life rich, flies in the social media's face. As a new author, I am validated by how many people sign up for messages from me (...and by all means, please sign up).  Having said that, however, the magnitude of a nearby friend, one that shows up with treats when they hear a twitch in your best "I'm fine" survival voice, is measured on an earthquake scale.  

The 4.8 earthquake (which woke me up last night) is felt by all. But only one more richter point and it is feared by all.

A true friend is a wonder...they gently turn post-traumatic-stress from disorder to order...and growth. 

(or maybe even some fun.)

Why One of the first questions I ask of any caregiver is:

• “Are you getting enough sleep?”

It’s a pivotal question that becomes mission critical when the underlying truth is that our society stays sleep deprived. It's an epidemic in America where it seems that we must do more…just to stay afloat (…forget getting ahead…)
 
Why sleep?
Some evolutionary biologists are speculating that the purpose of sleep (a TedX talk by Jeff Iliff) is to take out the trash—to clean your brain of plaques. (Yes, that would be the same brain garbage which seems to be causing dementia…)
 
It's not our fault.
We are only trying to get ahead—like good Americans. We learned sleep deprivation early, as teenagers and still teach it now to our youth. The NY Times (9/14/2017 The Case for a Later Start to the School Day) reported that teens are sleep deprived and it has consequences. Several national studies have recommended a later start time for schools so the kids can get their 9 to 10 hours of recommended sleep. While it makes economic sense (would add $18K to each student's eventual lifetime earnings and $83 billion to the economy in ten years), it hasn’t happened and probably won’t. (Hey, their parents have to get to work…)
 
Real wealth is a good night's sleep, indeed.
 
The lack of even one night’s sleep makes us:

1. anxious
2. worsens your mood
3. lowers your pain threshold
4. interferes with learning and memory
5. diminishes your ability to concentrate
6. make you more impulsive
7. increases your blood pressure
8. elevates stress
9. harms the immune system
10. cause weight gain. 

Add this context to the hyper-vigilance of 24/7 caregiving of a loved one and you have potential catastrophe. Fortunately, we can do something about this.
 
What to do? In the Upward Spiral by neuroscientist, Alex Korb we must
·      1. Improve ‘sleep hygiene’
·      2. Deal with our anxieties and stress
 
Stress we know about...caregiving gives you a black belt in stress. I recommend a spiritual practice of eight things which I will cover in the future blog posts (and the Field Guide which will be published in later 2017).
 
Sleep Hygiene
Its not even as bad a flossing. All you do is edit what potentially interferes with

1. Your bedtime routine – make one and keep it. Your brain can be trained.
2. Light in your bedroom – avoid bright lights after the sun goes down. Turn down the blue lights of your computers. Some (like Amazon Fire and others) do this automatically. Bright lights make your brain think it is time to wake up.
3. Level of noise in your sleeping area.  Many people benefit from white noise. Try a HEPA filter in the bedroom. You can also get white, (and other “colors”) of noise to calm you down to sleep.
4. Tell yourself a bedtime story…on a sleep timer… Have you discovered Audible? Books on tape? You are never too old to have someone read to you. Take your mind off your own story and listen to something beautiful…or happy. Most apps have a sleep timer

 
Let your own senses guide you. As you age, your sleep needs are changing too – you don’t need as much sleep as you did as a teenager but the true measure is how do you feel?
 
Caregiving and sleep
You need sleep to caregive.

• 1. Ask for help. Ask a relative to come over and take the night shift so you can sleep.
• 2. Make a list of your worries and put it aside.
• New neuroscience says labeling negative issues gives the brain a way to relax.
• 3. Prompt sleep with good habits.  Gentle stretching is a good pattern but avoid playing video games or watching TV which can be too stimulating. Drinking alcohol may drop you into slumber but won't keep you asleep all night. Experiment with Melatonin which may support a good sleep. What works for you? 
• 4. Pray yourself asleep or use your breath.  It helps me to repeat my prayer of the season (and my spiritual mission statement...) to align myself to a higher and more peaceful place.  It’s like a shower, your spiritual practice is never done.
• 5. Be gentle with yourself. Don't judge. It will carry over into your next day and your ability to love ‘what is’ (or who is) in the next room.

 
Did you get enough sleep? It is the best of questions to answer. It’s your life to be lived.

 Helping incurs debt.
According to Dr. Rachel Naomi Remen, helping is very different than serving. When you go all Florence Nightingale on your beloved, it is hard to take. You want to help but this help is not helping—or you could help so much more.

It's messier. It takes a bit more time but serving is infused with respect...and trust.
ASK them if what your doing, needs doing, or is it helpful? Asking gives them control. It turns into serving—as a peer and an equal. When I fix, I am telling them that they are broken.

        "We serve life, not because it is broken, but because it is holy." —Mother Teresa 

They are not broken...they are just ill.
Good medical care is changing in a similar manner.  State-of-the-art hospital  are instilling empathy into their employees.  Check out this Cleveland Clinic video.  It is about being in the moment...respecting the person with dignity.  Unlearning Certainty is a rule that is essential for empathy—that you can use to heal.
​

Dr. Remen further explains good health (for everyone) is about collaborating:

"When I fix a person I perceive them as broken, and their brokenness requires me to act. When I fix I do not see the wholeness in the other person or trust the integrity of life within them.  When I serve I see and trust that wholeness. It is what I am responding to and collaborating with." Noetic Sciences Review # 37

Fixing is a form of judgement and it creates disconnection... and that's the last thing we want with our loved one.

Healthier for us, too.
When we collaborate with our loved ones, we have a better shot at the gold standard of caregiving—healthy resilience—than if we try to fix. 

Promises, Promises, Promises...
If you are reading this new blog, it is likely you are (either my brother, Ted...) or a caregiver who as randomly found this post via search engine serendipity. Welcome.

I have been where you are—the stressed out caregiver who is just trying to hold their house (of cards) together for themselves and their ill beloveds.

You are hard to reach...but I am persistent (and clever).
I remember when it was so for me (so hard to listen...) and get any information because I was on 24/7 duty with too little sleep, and too many worries about how I was going to manage.  I felt very alone—even in the middle of friends because I wasn't thinking, I could ask or really even deserved the world's help. Hey, don't be too hard on my hard head.  I am from the Oklahoma prairie and (even having lived in The San Francisco Bay area for decades), the rugged individualism is a persistent taproot in my garden.

But the equally perennial and persistent question is how to use what I know—to support you? 
I have taken what one of my gurus has recently posted in The Marketing Seminar:

       "It’s about connecting the dots for someone, using the dots they know. " —Seth Godin

Seth is talking about marketing in the quote...but, as usual, his reach is greater. As a hospice chaplain and a long-time caregiver in the trenches of love, I know stuff. 

I promise you, in this blog, that I will use all the (considerable) dots at my disposal to serve you. Which is very different than helping...or fixing, but that is the next blog post.

Best blessings on your day,

Rev. E.M.