Care Giving

• R E L A T I O N S H I P S | Care giving. My father-in-law is still in the hospital, his heart will not stay regulated. Everyday my mother-in-law leaves early in the morning and comes home late at night from the hospital. It’s about an hour drive each way. In the past 8 days, I have only seen her in passing as she will leave in haste early in the morning to make the doctors’ rounds at the hospital and come home spent from a days worth of hospital busyness and biding time in the uncertainty of my father-in-law’s recovery. I see the wear the surgery and recovery has had on her. She mentioned it too, and asked that I say something about care giving, so here it goes.
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  When care giving, you can:
  ➰Ask for help.
  ➰Share the load.
  ➰Take breaks.
  ➰Give in ways you want to give.
  ➰Set limits/boundaries.
  ➰Say no.
  ➰Stop.
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  There will be times, however, when you will have to give it all you’ve got, you will blow through your boundaries and tax yourself to the max for someone else: pregnancy, labor, delivery, and postpartum are prime examples of boundary blowers. There will also be times when parenting and partnerships will surpass your good judgement on giving care too. These things will fatigue you, maybe even disorient you for a while. That’s ok and to be expected. It’s life-- giving you all it’s got.
  
  Photo x @mariellevchua