This is the Whole Care Network. Music Helping you tell your story, one podcast at a time. Content presented in the following podcast is for information purposes only. Views and opinions expressed in this podcast are solely those of the host and guest and may not represent the views and opinions of the Whole Care Network. Always consult with your physician for any medical advice and always consult with your attorney for any legal advice. And thank you for listening to the Whole Care Network. Music Are you exhausted by the constant advice? Don't forget to take care of you. I mean, it sounds overwhelming with everything that you're juggling. Seriously? In today's episode, Sue and I are talking with Elizabeth Miller, founder of the Happy Healthy Caregiver about the realities of self-care. Everyone, let's get started. Welcome. We are Sue Ryan and Nancy Treister. This podcast brings our years of experience in a variety of family caregiving roles to prepare you to navigate your caregiving journey. We're sharing our personal experiences, not medical advice. And because it's our passion to support you on your journey, we believe no topic is on limits. Let's get started. Music Welcome, Elizabeth. We are so glad to have you here and glad that we're all here in person to be able to share this. For our listeners, I'm going to begin by reading you Elizabeth's bio and then I'm going to introduce Elizabeth as I know her. So, Elizabeth, you are a family caregiver. You're a caregiver advocate, a speaker, an author, podcast host. You're a certified caregiving consultant, which is a lot of work to become that. And you're also a certified senior advisor. You really know what you're talking about because your personal experiences include caring for your aging parents with chronic and terminal illnesses, as well as for a sibling with developmental disabilities. These are what inspired you and it's now been nearly 10 years. This is your 10th year with the happy, healthy caregiver. So, welcome. And now I'm going to share with the audience who I know and who I know you from the very first time I've met you, is someone who really is passionate about helping all of us. Your messages come from your head and your heart. You've thought through all the things that you're doing. You're very intentional about giving messages that help us remember that there is joy in our lives and to look at the entire person, to look at holistically what we're doing. And you bring that. You've created a variety of resources. I've been using your journal for years and you walk the walk and you talk the talk and we are so fortunate that we're going to have you talk about one of the topics that you are so masterful with, which is self-care. So, let's get started. Sweet, thank you so much. Thank you for having me. What a treat that we can all do this together. I essentially created what I wish existed for me as a family caregiver. I know this is what has inspired you all to create the caregiver's journey. And I'm learning from caregivers every day. I think the caregivers are the experts in caregiving. And so you all are spotlighting what you have learned and sharing it with the world and what to do a similar thing. Just make somebody's journey a little bit easier. I resonated with what you said Nancy in the beginning about, you know, how annoying it is when people say you take care of yourself. And it's hard because that is what I talk about all the time. I talk about self-care and I certainly don't want to do it in an annoying way. I felt similar in that I felt like people were shoulding on me. You should take care of yourself. And yet so frustrated that I didn't understand what that could really look like because I was a person who was in a sandwich generation caregiver, caring for older adults, raising middle school kids, working a full-time job and feeling like I was on a constant treadmill. So what did that really look like? I have evolved my definition of what self-care is over the years. I, where I am today, feel that my definition of self-care is anything that is going to provide me with emotional or physical energy, anything that is going to provide peace of mind and anything that offers just pure joy. Elizabeth, would you please say that again? That is so powerful and impactful. Please, please. So put everything through a filter if this is going to help you. Is this self-care for you? Does it give you emotional and physical energy? Or does it provide peace of mind? Or is it just pure joy? Love that. That's a wonderful definition. Yeah, it really is. And it is evolved. And I think one of the things we learn as caregivers and people share a lot to caregiving community is that we need to put the oxygen mask on ourselves before we care for other people. That frustrated me because I felt like, you know, when we're in an airline situation in a crisis, it's going to be obvious, right? There's going to be flashing lights. The masks are going to come down. People are going to be telling us, hey, now's the time. That's not reality. When we're on this treadmill of life, there's no flashing lights and things coming out from the sky. That would be so helpful, actually. The oxygen mask would be good. Flash, flash, you're not practicing self-care. So it doesn't work that way. So I had to figure out a different analogy that worked for me. And one that I have landed on and share is that it's like feeding a nest of hungry birds. And your birds are representing your job, your kids, your pets, your home, your relationships with your spouse, your哎哎哎哎哎哎哎哎哎哎哎哎哎哎哎哎哎哎哎哎哎哎哎哎哎哎哎哎哎哎哎哎哎哎哎哎哎哎哎哎哎哎哎哎哎哎 I'll tell you one of the things that I kind of figured out over the long haul is that the diagnosis of an entire audience of dementia diagnosis. You're at the doctor and you get your your care receiver gets a dementia diagnosis and you're at that point. You're a caregiver. You don't even know it. You don't recognize the term. But caregiving is not just for the care receiver. It's for you as well. So you are a team that needs cared for. So yes, you're providing a lot of the caregiving, but both of you need as the primary caregiver, both of you need to be cared for. And so you're responsible not just for caregiving for your care receiver. You're responsible for your own caregiving as well. And I know what it looks like when you don't do that. Tell us. Because in my professional career, I just went, I was like doing more, doing more, doing more, doing more. And that was what I was used to. So I become a caregiver and I'm like, well, I can shave off going to the gym every day. I could shave off an hour of sleep. Can we get get the things done? I didn't get done during the day. And I can do a little of this and a little of that. And then one day I fixed my husband lunch and I had him a nice little sandwich and some potato chips and all of a sudden he picked up the potato chip and drops it on the floor. A potato chip. No big deal. And inside, I just went nuts. Like seriously, you can't even be responsible for eating a sandwich and I've been working so hard all day. I got up before, blah, blah, blah, blah, all those. And now fortunately, that stayed inside. It did not come on the outside because I had a little grace of space that what came here didn't have to come here. However, that's nothing I would even normally even think. And it was a silly potato chip. I gathered myself, put more potato chips on the plate, said, honey, I'll be right back. And I went in the other room and I sat down and I was literally shaking. And it's like, what on earth happened? And what had happened is I was not practicing self care and I just kept shaving off, shaving off, thinking it was okay. And I also had not gotten something very valuable, which is an accountability partner who can hold me to practicing self care. And I did fine. You've got to do it. Well, I think your story, Sue, thank you for sharing that. First of all, like I think we have to be vulnerable in order to kind of get unpacked the stuff. And we hear sometimes about the analogy of the frog boiling in water, like you wouldn't have jumped into a boiling pot of water of caregiving, but it's a slow boil over the months and the years. And we all kind of get to, we all have that potato chip moment. I had my first panic attack as a caregiver. I didn't even know I was having a panic attack. But I mean, at one point, they even in a doctor's office got like an EKG machine for me to check things out. So it's, we all kind of get to that point where enough is enough. And hopefully we can have this conversation here with you all today. So to say, let's help you not get to this point. Exactly. Let's help mitigate burnout and teach different strategies that maybe you can try on that will help help make this sustainable for you. So Elizabeth, from the three of us, because, yeah, and learn from the three of us because each one of us has that story of when it finally clicked that this is not working. Yeah. And so this episode is to try to help you go through some strategies to keep that from happening. Let's go ahead and then get started with tip number one of our four tips. Elizabeth. Tip number one is to give yourself permission. It's counterintuitive, right? We're taking care of everybody else. So we, we don't feel like we can take care of ourselves. Yeah. And why that is maybe what we feel like we're guilty about it. We feel it's selfish. We feel like this person is having such a tough time at life. How dare us go out and experience so far. None of these are anything that serve us. Yeah. So it is counterintuitive. And yet in order to make caregiving sustainable, hopefully get to that point where you figure out that you do need the permission to do that because you do have the diagnosis for many of you who are a dementia caregiver. This is not a short term thing. Right. Average caregivers four and a half years of caregiving some from dementia caregiving I'm sure is closer to 10. So how do we make this sustainable? And the first thing is to, to give yourself permission. You know, I actually needed someone to physically tell me I had permission. How about that for interesting? So it's a concept. Give yourself permission because we don't because we feel guilty or what would other people think that's another thing. But I went to a therapist after a couple of years into my husband's diagnosis and was talking to her about what was going on and about my feelings and all that goes with that. And she said, well, I am giving you permission to do what you want to do sometimes and to take care of you. And we had a long conversation about that. And I got home and I realized, well, I really needed her to tell me I had permission to do it. So literally she used those words, but I needed to hear that you have permission to take care of you. Yeah. So do you think it mattered that it was a professional or could it been, you know, a close friend or somebody, you know, I think it was the word permission that really stuck with me because I thought, Oh, I've got permission to do this. And it made perfectly good sense. You know what, we're all professionals. We're giving you permission. We're giving you permission. Exactly. We give you permission. Permission granted. Permission granted. Yes. All right. So let's talk a little bit about tip two, because I think self care is a term that everybody has their own little definition of. And you have some good advice about how to think about it a little more broadly. Yes. Think about it broadly. So when I was first on this journey with happy, healthy caregiver and starting to try on different things, almost like we try on clothes, right? To see what's going to fit because all of our self care for each other is going to be different on what's going to hit the energy, the peace of mind, the joy. We're not one size fit all. I was very super focused on physical self care. Okay. Initially it was eating right and exercise and it made sense because as a caregiver, the people that I were caring for made poor lifestyle choices. And so I was so fearful of reinventing that same cycle again for my kids that I did not do that. So I went all in on physical and I think that's a little bit of what the media does too. Yeah. Also like that we need to spend a lot of money in order to have self care. We got to have weekends away and nights on the town and wonderful trips, which are great. But as a caregiver, we, I had to figure out what was realistic as far as, you know, someone who worked full time with kids and caregiving. So trying on different things. I have over the years fallen on that all of the content that I share on happy healthy caregiver podcast and on the website falls into eight categories of self care. So we're going to name those out for you. Practical self care. Okay. Sometimes it's just cleaning off your desk. Emotional self care. Sometimes going with therapist for me, it was journaling, social self care, we're doing it. We're together right now. Spiritual self care, whatever your spiritual journey looks like for you. Intellectual self care, learning something new, trying something new, financial self care, budgeting, you know, what are you going to do for charitable things could be a broad type thing. How are you going to pay for some of the some of the things that are expensive with caregiving? We don't think about that as self care, but that's going to offer us peace of mind when we figure that out. Professional self care, we all deserve to have to make a living and do something professionally. So what are the skills and so forth that we need there. And then physical self care and I intentionally kind of put that one last because I think it gets it gets too much attention. Yeah, you're right. It does get a lot of attention. It feels like, oh yeah, that's the thing you're missing. Yes. What is helpful for me with those is it gets me out of the single thread, like you said, for the physical part and helps me be open to considering what could self care look like. And it could be as simple as for example, when I go out to water my plants now, I get great joy and I celebrate what they look like and things like that. Now for some people, they would be. I don't celebrate what they look like. Yeah, at my house. I do. I do. Social self care, they take on. I like it. And yet it makes me feel good. So it can be any kind of a thing. Nothing is too small. No. If it brings you joy. And you can combine them. So yes, social self care. So I told myself that I felt like I was missing something. It's I mean something in my life outside of all the caregiving responsibilities, but there was I was really trying hard to take vacations and to do things, but something still felt like I was really being missing something. And I decided it was going out at night. And I was like, hmm, normal people go out at night and I don't think I had done that for months and months and months. So I decided that once a month I was going to go out at night. I was going to get a caregiver and go out at night. And so I would go to a cooking class, which is a combination of which to intellectual and social. I learned how to cook something new. And I socialized with a friend and or a group of people that I that I didn't know. Anyway, that's another sort of thing to think about is that you can certainly I love a two for we all have a buy one buy one get one. So, you know, I used to feel guilty with going back to the guilt thing like we're playing words with friends. Like this is a waste of time. No, it's I've reframed it. It is intellectual self care. And it is also social social self care because I'm playing with my, you know, 80 year old aunt, you know, and some other relatives and friends that I from high school, even. So, yeah, we can reframe that stuff. I like it. It brings you joy. Keep doing it. And these categories are listed somewhere that they can find them. Yes, underneath the resources on happy, healthy caregiver dot com, you can find the different self care categories. So if you feel like you want to kind of dive deeper into any of these, you can certainly go there. Well, now we've given ourselves permission and we have started to think more broadly about it. Now, let's prioritize it. I like that. Yes. I mean, sometimes people ask me for my best self care tip and it's really not, you know, earth shattering. It's basically scheduling it, scheduling and making making time for yourself so that it can be put into motion because we can talk about it all we want. One of the activities that I love to do and I want to invite the listeners to do is something called the 20 for 25. This is 20 things in this year that you bring you joy, bring you energy, bring you peace of mind, all of that. Nothing is drudgery on here. This is all stuff that you want to look forward to doing. One of the things on my list is to do the self care at sea cruise in October. So I'm going with some fellow care advocates will link to that here. Hopefully so we invite you all to go because you can come for the respite but leave with the community and their resources. So some of them are big things like travel, but some of them are little things like I would love to learn how to play mahjong. There you go. That sounds like after a lot of people say that's a lot of fun. With something I invited you all to do this, Sue and Nancy. We did it. What did you have on your, with something on your 20 for 25? My first point is to reengage my spiritual junior. Something I used to really invest a lot of time with and chose to not prioritize for a period of time. And now it's time to prioritize it again. And I'm very excited about I actually went back afterward and I added a heart to it. So yeah. Yeah. I love it. You know, so I put walk outside is one of my top ones because I tend to feel compelled to be on the treadmill to be in the house all the time. And so, you know, every now and then take the chance and go outside instead. Yeah. I'm curious how you're going to that's going to make you feel because I'm not till April. Okay. I find a lot of energy by being outdoors. Yes. Like it is definitely one of my go to strategies. Yes. And getting sunlight. I get back to it. That's the only way for the, you know, I used to always walk outside and now I there's a big world out there. I know. Get out there. I'm going to go back to the other thing that goes along with this and just thinking about the cruise as a topic. I intentionally schedule two vacations a year I have for the last probably five years well post COVID so almost five years with my sister and I thought and these are travel vacations and I thought what will people think. I mean, I really the first time I thought because I do have to get somebody to come. I did have to get somebody to come care for my husband and I thought what will people think. Yeah. And the strangest thing is that all I have ever gotten is, oh my goodness, that's so wonderful to hear. Yeah. Good for you. Good for you. I'm so glad to hear you did that. That's awesome. I've never gotten anybody even gave me a funny look. People truly when they give you that advice that's so annoying. They really mean it. And so I only got positive feedback for for making the effort to go on vacation. So the cruise sounds wonderful and I may actually go. I love that. I love that. So on that note, I'm giving myself credit for scheduling vacations and actually going on them. I think we ought to go to tip four, which is give yourself some credit. Give yourself some credit. I think, you know, we talk a lot about to do lists as caregiver. Yes. Let's talk about a to-da list. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Let's talk about the things that we are doing right. Yes. You know, I think sometimes we can tend to just gravitate towards the negative of things, but we're doing a lot of stuff that is is working right. And so there are things I guarantee that each of you listening are doing that is self care right now in one of those eight categories. If you are, you know, sleeping, if you are making a meal, if you're brushing your teeth, if you're paying your bills, all of that is self care. And, you know, that's that's a starting point and that to-da that we should celebrate celebrate that. And then, you know, I think, and then inviting people to think about, okay, what, what else is missing that would particularly energize me or give me peace of mind or joy and putting putting that in there, but definitely give yourself credit. I like it. I do. I like that. And it's be proud of yourself that you are doing that and celebrate teeny tiny little things. You're not mentioning huge things. Well, the cruise is a huge thing, but a lot of the other things we talk about, right, they don't have to be a big moment there. It's just you are doing something. And then the more that we become aware of these things, the more we start to doing the things that we've been talking about. Elizabeth, this has been wonderful with your tips. Let's let's go ahead and summarize and share with us any final comments you've got. I'm excited. I could be doing this, by the way, all afternoon. I mean, this is, there's a lot to unpack on self care because we need examples from other family caregivers of what is working for them and what we could potentially try on that might also work for us because we need to figure out how this is going to be sustainable or we're all going to burn out. And so I invite people to stay connected through happy, healthy caregiver.com. You can learn about the cruise. You can check out the podcast, which only, you know, spotlights real family caregivers. You can get your 20 for 25 facts. 25. You can get your fun sheets, not a worksheet. It's a fun sheet. Let me get one of the other things. I use your hang on a minute. All right. You can check out the journal. This is, you know, I want people to have an easy way to try on journaling. So the just for you daily self care journal. And then I also will do a weekly newsletter. So every week I send something happy, something healthy, something care related. And I have heard from people that even beyond caregiving, they like to stay subscribed because it's, it just gives them new ideas. I like it. That's awesome. Thank you so much, Elizabeth, for joining us today to talk about the realities of self care. We talked about four tips. The first tip was give yourself permission. The second tip, think broadly. The third tip, give self care the right priority. And the fourth tip and my favorite is give yourself a pat on the back. Celebrate what you are doing that self care. Now, if you have self care tips that you think other people could take advantage of, please go out to our Facebook page or our Instagram page and put those tips out there so other people can see them. If you like this podcast, please follow it or subscribe to it and rate it or review it. We really appreciate that. Everything we talked about here that is a resource that you can get to will be in the show notes. And Elizabeth, I can't tell you how much I enjoyed just spending time today talking about self care. It makes me feel so good when you think about the things you can do for yourself and hopefully energizes people. Like you said. Yeah. Hopefully. Thank you for having me here. You're very welcome. We're all on this journey together.
