What It Takes

I am a Consultant for Healthcare IT implementations, and I am frequently changing jobs. Updating my resume and going through the interview process is inherent in my line of work, so I am often questioned on my qualifications. The other day after another interview, it occurred to be, no one asked me if I was qualified to take care of Gramps! The most important job ever!  The painful reason is simple, no one else wanted that job. Maybe that is unfair, and maybe others would’ve stepped up if I had not, but the simple fact remains. When Gramps was in need, I stepped forward, and others stepped off. Anyone would do, as long as it wasn’t them.

I was talking to a girlfriend yesterday and she was saying how she was covering for someone that left her company and that required getting to work at 4am. She isn’t a morning person. So, after a few weeks of crack-of-dawn days, the next applicant that came along was “thee one.” She could not wait for the new hire. As she put it, her thought process was “Is she breathing? Yes? Okay, she is qualified, done, congratulations!”

When I became a Caregiver, I really did not know if I had what it takes to take care of Gramps. I was terrified. My prayer to God was, “please don’t let him die.” Every day, he made it through felt nothing short of a miracle.

One of my first experiences with taking care of Gramps was one for the books. Gramps was in a wheelchair and I was putting him to bed in the hospital bed. He got into bed fine, but in getting in the bed he knocked the phone down behind the bed! Now the phone is beeping because it’s off the hook. So I tell Gramps to just stay in bed and I can get the phone. I shimmy under the bed, and as I am grabbing the phone, the gate to the hospital bed falls and literally traps me under the bed. Between the gate, the walls, and the footboard, I am trapped –no way out. So Gramps was like, I can help you, and I see he is trying to get out of bed. I was like “No! I am okay, you stay put, I will be out in a second.” I laid there for a good while, and yes, I started to cry (quietly! I didn’t want to upset Gramps). I remember thinking, well, at least I have the phone, I can dial 9-1-1- if it comes to that. I was scared. Fear was all I felt back then. This time, my fear was that I just couldn’t do it and someone was going to get hurt. I mean, how stupid was this?! Eventually I Houndini’d out of that mess and I am still not sure if I fit between the gate bars or what, but I do recall that I felt totally ill-equipped to take care of Gramps. I didn’t know what we were going to do. I felt sorry for Gramps, getting stuck with me, and frankly, I felt sorry for myself for putting us both in this position.

We made it another three years together. We shared a lot of adventures like this one. Here is what I learned…What does it take to be a Caregiver? Love. One word. Plain. Simple. It takes love to do what we do to take care of another human being. Some things will go fine. Others not so fine. If what you are doing is based in love, truly coming from the heart, God provides and it will work out. You are enough. You are qualified. With love in your heart, you’ve got what it takes.