It's the small things

On the one hand, you'll find that live-in carers are strong, independent women.

We are survivors.

We do what it takes to make our lives work for us.







On the other hand, hell it would be good to have a bit of spoiling. Some self-indulgence.

5 things I do to perk up my day:

1. Read for half an hour on a bench under a tree
2. Have a real conversation with a good friend, a son, or my Mum
3. Go for a walk (or some retail therapy if it is raining)
4. Put on make up if the boiler/alarm/ANY service is due (don't judge me, any visitor to the house is worth the effort!)
5. Take lots of deep breaths and remind myself that I am doing this for a reason, and nothing is forever.

What do YOU do to make your day just that little bit better?

Carer's survival kit

Good for those days when it all just feels so... so.... well not very good.

Chocolate treat for wellbeing

Allsorts for variety

Health bars to make up for the wellbeing and variety

Headphones for surreptitious listening to music while nobody is looking....

What is your favourite treat?

GUEST POST: Lorraine

Dear Margi,

I went on the Care to Travel Facebook page and noticed your blog. Started to read it and felt most depressed.

I hear your sentiments, understand your frustrations...... Because your voice is my voice.

Selling your house - that was letting go of the one thing you had that belonged to you, a foundation, a root, like a plant; once you pull it out it dies and that is how I feel, dead.

I sympathise, I understand the loneliness. I respect the vulnerable side of the elderly, but does that mean I must die inside to give further life.

The more I think on this the more I realise it's not the job, it's living their life, it's giving of yourself and losing who you are. Where we give hope and enlightenment, we lose who we were once upon a time.

My self identity seems to have got lost in transit

It's finding that happy medium

It's making sure that our lives do not sail away, where one day we awake to find we need a Carer, so in actual fact our life just carries on from where it left off... With a client

In life we have got to learn we were all put on this earth for a reason. We all have a certain time given to us. They have had their time, do we have to throw away ours?

That is how I am starting to look at what I am doing , and right at this moment, I do not believe this was the life carved out for me!

We all need a foundation, we all need roots, we all need to embrace life, and not death that will come one day and maybe sooner than we expect.

Care life can be rewarding but we must not become a prisoner of our own emotions.

Thank you to Lorraine for this response to my "Independent and free, or homeless" post. It does help to know that we all have our ups and downs and doubts about our current way of life.

Independent and free, or homeless?

Sometimes, I really miss having a home. Is that a common thing for live in carers? I will be meeting up with some colleagues next week so will ask the question!                                                                                                                        I thought I was going to be free, having fun, the eternal traveller, but it sometimes seems that all I am doing is trying earn enough to take short vacations, and I never make it home. I sold my house back in Cape Town last month. It has just hit me. The finality of it. The place I raised my children, where most of my memories were made.                                                                                                                                So the obvious solution would be to make some more memories. Starting on Wednesday... with two weeks off to play....

Cambridge. A city of romance, art, history, books...

... and lots and lots of bicycles.

The colleges are impressive 

I made some new friends....

St John's College - I got the guided tour, courtesy of a real "Johnian"

A real feeling of the past

Bridge of Sighs. Look familiar? Think: The Theory of Everything.

Now this bin used to have arms, and a guitar, and it sang...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Db8DpIlgcg

City of romance

... and interesting places

next time!

... and sunsets

A moment to absorb it all

“You are the average of the five people you spend the most time with”. Jim Rohn

That said, I spend my time with a 99 year old lady with severe dementia. All of my time.  Constantly. Each shift being three to five weeks long. 

How many people am I the average of now?

From one minute to the next, I don't know what I am going to be met with. Who am I? Her sister? A long lost friend? A stranger?

Where am I?

What story am I walking in to? 

Does she eat porridge today, or does she despise it, as was the case yesterday? Will she take her medicine? Or spit it out? Or politely refuse it, with all the charm and grace of the Queen Mother?

Will she be happy to see me? "Oh, my darling, how lovely of you to visit. Will you be staying long?"

Or will I be in the way? "Stop it! You are always interfering when I need to discipline this boy! Get out!"

How many plates will she break today? Will her tea end up splashed over the wall as she tries to fend off a threatening stranger (or the little boy who teases her?)

When she calls for her mother, is it because they are rushing to catch the midnight train? Or looking for her sister? Or is she simply wanting to die?

Will she allow the assisting carer in today? Or will she send her packing, with a "and don't you come back here, you are not wanted!"? Leaving me with a bedridden old lady to spend the night in tea-stained pyjamas and a wet diaper? And the fourteen hours of complaints that will follow before the next carer arrives, at 8am the following day?

Why do I do this? Who is it helping? Does the old lady even know that she is in her own home? "I just want to go home to my dog and my mother" is the plaintive cry I hear at least once a day.

Is it helping her family? Who visit once a month for two days, work permitting? Do they feel less guilty for leaving her, knowing that she is at home with a live in carer, and not in an institution? 

I wish I knew the answers.

What I do know is this. As I opened her curtains this morning, she reached her arms out to me, told me how much she loves me, wishes we could spend just one more night together as if I was a soon-to-be-gone lover, and my heart broke. With love for this poor old lady who retains all the vibrancy of youth. With sadness, knowing that one morning she will not wake up. With despair, because I don't know if I can carry on with this lifestyle for much longer. But for as long as I can, I will strive to make her last days, months, years at this rate, as good as I can for her.

A small town called Chieveley - Autumn walking

Chieveley, Newbury. My smallest town so far. A newsagent with a post office counter, a pub, and a church. And miles and miles of beautiful farmland, made for walking.
I was averaging 5 - 10km a day here. What is that in miles?
May I present Chieveley in October:

A rose outside my bedroom window.
My first view of every day.

The first of hundreds of pics taken while walking.
I love paths that disappear into the distance,
 reflected in the clouds.

How NOT to shoot a delicious mixed seafood platter.
Battered fish taking on a new meaning.
Lunch for two at The Crab
http://www.crabatchieveley.com/

I nearly turned back here. This was pre-boot days.

Never know what is around the corner.
In this case, a bridge over a busy road!

Gravestones in Autumn

Never know who you will meet when walking
in the country

Colourful birdlife outside the kitchen window

The beginning of another long walk

Pathways...

Go round yet another corner, and find eggs for sale,
and some llamas!

Bridge - fields behind me, woods ahead.

The gate at the end of the bridge

Through the gate, and into a magical fairy land

Friendly little robin came to say hi to me.

One of the walking trails I found after crossing a field