5 Things Every Caregiver Needs to Hear

By Lane Morris Buckman

If you are a caregiver for someone with dementia, you probably spend a lot of time looking for the best ways to care for your loved one. You probably have a wealth of knowledge stored up about the best ways to manage your loved one's needs, medicine, pain, appointments, even the best ways to get them scooted up to the table at dinner time. This

• Language: English
• Publisher: The Outside Lane Books
• Release date: Oct 28, 2022
• ISBN: 9780996404150

Book preview

5 Things Every Caregiver Needs to Hear

Lane Morris Buckman

Copyright © 2022, The Outside Lane Books

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

Cover art by Dua Zaheen

Print ISBN: 978-0-9964041-6-7

Ebook ISBN: 978-0-9964041-5-0

For all caregivers everywhere, but especially those who are dealing with dementia.

Contents

Introduction

The Five Things Every Caregiver Needs to Hear

Your Best Is Enough

Safe. Fed. Clean.

You Can’t Fix Dementia

If Love or Effort Could Cure Dementia…

You Have to Take Care of Yourself

Death Math

You Have to Choose the Path That Works Best for Your Situation

Wheelchair Quarterbacks

You Are Not Required to Take Care of Someone Who Has Abused You

Stages of Grief on Repeat

Finding Joy

Conclusion

Acknowledgments

About the Author

Introduction

If you are a caregiver for someone with dementia, you probably spend a lot of time looking for the best ways to care for your loved one. You probably have a wealth of knowledge stored up about the best ways to manage your loved one’s needs, medicine, pain, appointments, even the best ways to get them scooted up to the table at dinner time. This book is not about what you need to know. This book is about what you need to hear.

I am not a medical professional, or a licensed expert. I am just someone who has been in the trenches for a very long time. I have been in an active caregiver situation for a patient with dementia of some sort since I was fifteen years old. That’s more than thirty-five years of hands-on experience with Alzheimer’s and dementia, adult diapers and feeding tubes, ICU psychosis and Sundown Syndrome. I have researched everything from the right way to find a senior community for my mom, to how to convince a ninety-two year-old man to take a pill. Spoiler: You can’t just put it in peanut butter.

I have witnessed my loved one’s slip away slowly as dementia stole even their memories of how to swallow food. Then, I have grieved and found myself starting over again with an entirely new loved one to care for.

I’ve seen a lot of things. I’ve lived through a lot of things. I know a lot of things.

I’m going to share with you the truths I needed to hear–the truths I think all caregivers need to hear with both their heads and their hearts. I hope when you put this book down, you feel seen, you feel understood, and you feel a little bit better about your lot in life.

Dementia is bad. If you’re caring for someone with dementia, you are living a worst case scenario. Dementia doesn’t get better. It is a long, slow death, with an excruciating grief process because we lose our loved ones over and over again as they level-down with their disease.

Caregiving