Caring for others is an Art.

Be it as informal as helping a friend out through a time of grief or illness, or as formal as being a paid care-giver, when the art is perfected, it enhances and empowers both parties and robs none.  

Helpful care – not all “care” is care or helpful – requires planning, skillful beginnings, and open discussions about how to know when the season of informal or formal care can end.   

Caring too much, over-functioning, being constantly aware and anxious, when caring depletes the care-giver, may indicate confusion as to  who is caring for whom and we can legitimately ask, “Who is this really for?” It gets murky when the carer takes on responsibilities not his or her own or when the recipient of care “throws in the towel” or hands it off to the carer. 

Caring is not primarily adherence to a set of routines or rules although it may indeed involve guidelines and expectations and rules and the spectrum of those who may be in need of care is wide, almost endless, tied to age and degrees of awareness and what resources are or are not available.

These many variables aside: the carer who neglects self-care and neglects to regard self-care as a priority will be depleted until he or she becomes  no source of care at all.

Posted on March 25, 2025 at 6:12 am in Difficult Relationships   |  RSS feed |   Reply   |   Trackback URL