People call me codependent. If you combined and then divided me and my partner in half, you might...
Category: Occasional Caregiving
So many of us are providing care to someone with an episodic chronic illness, who may not need much or any care between flares. We may be ready to jump in and provide care after surgery or respite care. Caregiving requirements and responsibilities can fluctuate significantly over time.
The Switzerland schedule
“Your mother,” he told us, “has multiple sclerosis.” Whatever that was. I carried on with my day...
How to Care For Your Friend Having Gender Affirming Surgery
There are many surgery prep documents out there that focus on the physical and material aspects of...
The Caregivers
A few years into the illness, Janie could sense it worsening. Buzz, who had never yelled at her,...
Youth Caregivers: Black and Brown Young People Have Cared for Relatives During COVID
When I hear the stories of Black and brown girls and gender expansive youth who provide care to...
How to Coordinate a Parent’s Care With Siblings
When it becomes clear that an aging parent needs caregiving, it’s uncharted territory for adult...
What the Conversation Around the “Great Resignation” Leaves Out
Since the beginning of the pandemic, one in five health care workers has left their job. They’ve...
The Care Crisis Isn’t What You Think
What my research participant made clear to me that day is that the lack of robust and accessible...
Churn
Nobody just “stops by” this house. My mother won’t let anyone she knows come near the outside,...
Wash
She showers once a week, and for the next six weeks—approximately four months into our new...
Friend to healthcare worker
I am currently helping friends with their severely disabled child. The child needs round-the-clock...
Should I Help My Aging, Ailing Dad Access His Toxic Web Feed?
My father and I have not been especially close for all of my adult life because of his inability...
The final five percent
For reasons I still can’t grasp, Conway — a brain-damaged burn victim with seven fingers — never...
A Marriage Stressed by Obsessions and Compulsions
As soon as we learned a new baby was on the way, Mike’s anxiety became more than an occasional...
How One Rural Town Without a Pharmacy Is Crowdsourcing to Get Meds
The building that once housed the last drugstore in this town of fewer than 600 is now a barbecue...
Chinese Cooking Helps Me Connect With My Mother—And Helps Me Prepare to Lose Her
The words that I could not bring myself to admit bubbled to the surface: I have been preparing for...
What it Means to Live in a Country that Does Not Guarantee Paid Family and Medical Leave
The United States stands alone among developed nations for failing to support families with paid...
Dad, a Death Sentence and the Planner Who Set Us Straight
During my dad’s illness, I experienced firsthand what had, until then, just been book learning:...
The Day His Journal Went Blank
Almost five years ago, when my father was 62, he learned he had Alzheimer’s disease. Over this...
A Deep Dive into Deep Kindness: What It Really Means to Be Kind
One of the most dangerous narratives we have in our culture currently is this idea that kindness...
Faces in a nursing home
Since mid-March, when they locked their doors to all visitors, long-term care facilities in Texas...
Stolen Years: Learning How to Fight Lewy Body Dementia
A month before my grandfather William passed away, I sat beside him in the hospital, pushing a...
Isolation and ‘impossible choices’: When caregiving goes into lockdown
Even before the coronavirus, caregiving had become Sade Dozan’s every day. About a year and a half...
How to Help Comfort a Loved One During a Hospital Stay
Follow these tips to make their hospital stay as easy as possible.