So many women at midlife are involved in some kind of caregiving. It could be for an aging parent or two, a spouse or significant other with an illness, or helping to get a friend through an illness.
B. Lynn Goodwin is a woman who knows what it’s like and she’s become an expert in self care for caregivers. The stress without relief can be deadly. She’s written a book titled, “You Want Me To Do What? Journaling for Caregivers” that I thought some of you might benefit from.
The rest of this post is from Lynn, some advice for all of us. According to Lynn, Making Time to Write Saves Lives.
”Are you a caregiver for a spouse, parent, child, special needs child, or yourself? If so, you are probably a multi-tasker and a nurturer who spends hours driving to appointments, stopping at the pharmacy, cooking, answering questions, paying bills, and controlling the resentment that can rise up when you have no time for yourself.
Why write about it?
Writing gives perspective and restores sanity. Writing is a lifeline as well as a record. Writing saves lives. Do not underestimate its power.
How do caregivers make time to write?
Some people write as soon as they get up in the morning. Some write while they are waiting for the coffee to brew. Some write during a lunch break. Others write before they go to sleep at night.
Some disappear into the bathroom with a notebook tucked into their pocket and emerge fifteen minutes later feeling less stressed. Some people jot down a few ideas while they are waiting in line at the grocery store or pharmacy. Others write while they wait for their children to get out of school or while their loved one naps. Making time to write even a few words will help clarify your thoughts and feelings. More always comes up once you start the pen moving across the page.
Journaling allows you to vent, delve into issues, and untangle messes. It lets you analyze or celebrate. It allows you to finish a thought without interruption. Journaling releases mental toxins and deepens awareness. It enables you to strip away the daily stress and let the strong, sane, safe, healthy, hopeful parts of you emerge.
What do you do if you have nothing to say? Try using sentence starts. All you need to do is finish the sentence and keep going. Go wherever the writing takes you. Explore fearlessly. Don’t worry if it’s not related to the topic, because topics are only suggestions.
Ready to give it a try? How would you finish a sentence that started “Today I feel…”?
Let the writing take you wherever it wants to. Feel free to make leaps. Trust yourself and trust the process. Write as much or as little as you want.
Here are some additional sentence starts for you to try:
Ø Today I believe…
Ø Today I want…
Ø Today I am…
Start where you are. Start with the mood you are in. Start with what you see and hear. Start with what needs to spill out.
Writing is therapeutic. It saves lives. Carve out a niche of time and just do it. Your truths are eager to come out. I’d love to hear about the doors that journaling opens for you.”
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B. Lynn Goodwin is the owner of Writer Advice, www.writeradvice.com and the author of You Want Me to Do What? Journaling for Caregivers, which contains encouragement, instructions, and over 200 sentence starts to help you journal any time.
We interrupt this series of avoiding weight gain to bring you 2 confessions.
Confession #1–I sometimes find myself watching E! or ET while waiting for House to come on. I try to turn away from Donnie and Marie–are they sleeping together?–Britney, Christie, Kelly, and the other celebs and their same old stories, skimpy outfits, and scandals. I fail, with a vengeance. I practice observing without judging. Judging is easy and fun and it may even burn calories so this is not so off topic afterall.
Last night’s 10 minutes brings me to the second confession and it has to do with Oprah. I teared up watching Oprah talk about her weight gain. Once again she has piled on 40 pounds. I wasn’t fighting back a full on sob because of that. Having her stand up and say “I can’t or don’t want to hide this anymore. I have not been taking care of myself” said O. That’s where my heart got pulled in.
She did not
This is where the sadness came up. I ache for those of us who can’t figure out how to love and care for ourselves especially when the physical manifestation is extra weight. It’s not about the number on the scale though we focus on that. It’s about the number you see yourself as. Say what you want about how it–the weight–doesn’t really matter. I think it really does. I’ve been there. It sucked.
A survey reported in USA Today a number of months ago reported that out of a few thousand average Americans who participated, 80% said the one thing they will regret not doing before they die is losing the weight they want to.
People, even a loss of a few percent of your total weight improves your life expectancy and healthy aging potential. Not to mention one less thing to regret.
It does not have to be that difficult. Oprah is starting an online program to take off the weight with her. I offer one as well, Spark People has lots of ways to get online and community support. Doesn’t matter who you choose but I encourage you to choose some form of help and then love yourself enough to stay with it.
