Episode 142: How Letting Our Caregiving Fears of the Future Steals Our Ability to Enjoy the Present

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Show Transcript

I have several pictures of my husband and daughter walking hand in hand in front of me. I always love capturing this sweet moment and the connection they have when I notice it. However, I have to admit that it often makes me sad.

Let’s talk about we hurt our ability to live in the present by looking too far into the future. 

When I take a picture of the two of them I sometimes feel sad for many reasons. Sometimes I am sad because I know my husband’s cancer has made both of their lives difficult and unsure and I would do anything to make that better if I could. 

It makes me sad because I know sometime in the future my daughter will grow up and move away and won’t have many opportunities to walk beside her dad. 

It makes me sad because it highlights the fact that in the future one of them may not be on this earth to be able to walk hand in hand. Or that my daughter will grow out of being alongside her dad. 

A simple sweet moment ruined by something that hasn’t and probably won’t ever happen. 

How many times do you find yourself laughing with a group of people and then remember your loved one has a doctor’s appointment next week and suddenly feel your stomach drop? 

How about snuggling with your husband and then suddenly feeling like you can’t breathe because of the thought of him having his bi-yearly appointment with the oncologist tomorrow? 

Or maybe living in constant worry of the possibility of losing your loved one to the point that you can never enjoy the day you’re living in with them?

It’s so hard to live in the present when the simple reason that you exist as a caregiver is based on what will happen to your loved one in the future. 

We have all of these markers we set to try to get to. Milestones we want to reach. Days we just want to get over and be done with. 

It seems we are always trying to work towards something. Getting them to walk again after surgery. Hoping they will fully heal after breaking a hip. Making it to the other end of chemo. Seeing them grow up to be an adult. 

So much focus on keeping them going that we lose sight of where we are. 

The fear of the future makes it difficult to enjoy the present. 

I remember my first six months of caregiving were ruled by fear and worry. So much so that I found myself close to tears all the time. Thrown into a scary and unpredictable world of cancer I couldn’t handle not knowing what was going to happen or having any control over it. I am positive I missed an embarrassing amount of moments to enjoy my family and be present for them because I was in a constant panic about losing my husband. 

The present is the only thing we are guaranteed yet we often find ourselves stuck in the past and making decisions for the future. 

There is so much we don’t catch because we aren’t paying attention to the things that are happening around us. Life does not wait for us to show up for it. It just keeps moving forward no matter if we want to participate in it or not. 

We’re just always so busy doing. So busy trying to keep up. So tired of trying to do all the things that we lose sight of what is really important to us.

I’ve done it myself. 

I’ve been too busy to just go take a short walk with my husband. I’ve had moments when I wasn’t fully invested in a conversation with my daughter because I was trying to work something out in my mind that was most likely trivial like figuring out what I’d make for dinner. 

I have let small moments of my life slip by because I was too focussed on the future. 

My coping mechanism for dealing with the stress of my husband going into surgery is cleaning. I clean everything, wash all the clothes, change all the sheets, make meals I can freeze, and set up support for when we get back home. It feels great. But I do it under the guise of being prepared so when we get back there is nothing that has to be done. Sure that’s part of why but really a lot of it has to do with me knowing I have no control over surgery and its outcome and will be useless to do anything but the bare minimum when we get back so I want to do something I feel I’m in control of. 

Do I need to do that? No. 

I could spend all of that energy putting together fun things to do with my husband and just spend time with him before the day of surgery instead of cleaning. It would probably have a higher benefit than having a clean house would. It would certainly allow us to have more opportunities to connect with each other at a time we really need emotional support. 

The sad part of it all is we have given up so much of our lives to be a caregiver for our loved ones yet we let ourselves become so consumed with the task of caregiving that we lose sight of actually enjoying life with the person we work so hard to keep in our lives. 

Isn’t that a curious thing? We will do anything to keep our loved ones alive yet we often find ourselves too busy to actually live with them.

I wonder how many times my husband felt lonely because I was too busy cleaning and making a meal for us while he was stuck in bed recovering. How many times did he feel responsible for my exhaustion and worried that it would create distance between us that would never be recovered? 

How many times has he really needed me to notice how he was feeling or just wanted me to sit beside him but didn’t feel he could ask?

We miss so many opportunities to enjoy our present when we are so busy worrying about the future. 

How many times have we said we’d do that fun thing with them when there was a time when we all know that time often is not on our side?

How do we live in the present? 

I think we really have to constantly keep ourselves open for opportunities that show up and be able to put down what we are working on in order to enjoy them. That could mean we physically set something down or we mentally let something go for even just a few moments. 

We need to create opportunities and reminders to stop being a caregiver one hundred percent of the time so we can simply be that daughter, wife, husband, and friend to the people we care for because we both need to find ways to enjoy life together. 

We need to stop being so turned off and tuned out of life. We need to turn up the volume and increase the brightness of the lives we’re living and turn down the noise in our minds. 

If we could simply stop to notice the snow, listen to the crunch of the leaves under our feet, and notice the trees blooming in the Spring we can find a stronger connection to our reality. If we could simply really see the people we live with, notice what makes them smile, allow ourselves to love them no matter how scary losing them in the future can feel, and be open to enjoying tiny moments with them throughout the day we can begin to bring ourselves out of the future and into the present where we belong. 

Being in the present could be difficult for you. It can hurt to be reminded of how much you love them because they aren’t the person you knew them to be anymore. Maybe you are scared of the emotions you’d feel if you suddenly weren’t too busy to feel them. Or it’s been so long since you just enjoyed time with your loved one the thought of doing something fun with them makes you anxious. 

Life is uncomfortable. We know that because caregiving isn’t easy or comfortable. If you’re a caregiver I know you can handle the uncomfortable feeling that slowing down might cause. I know you can handle doing something fun with the person you care for. 

Caregiving is a difficult role in life. There is a lot we have to do to give our loved ones the care that they need. However, we all have times when we can be doing less and slow down so we can actually live and love more. 

Thanks for listening.