Hope for the Caregiver: Family Talk 9/8/19

Welcome to Hope for the Caregiver.

This is Peter Rosenberger and I am so glad to have you with us. This is the nation's number one show for the family caregiver. For those who are caring for aging loved ones, disabled loved ones, special needs children, maybe you've got an alcoholic in your life, maybe you got an addict in your life.

That's a chronic impairment. If this is where you are as a caregiver, if this is what you're doing, you're putting yourself between somebody who has an impairment, an even worse disaster, then this is the show for you. And we are so glad that you're with us here on Family Talk Channel 131. If you want to be a part of the show, it is 877-655-6755.

877-655-6755. This is a brand new show to Sirius. We've been doing the show for six years and we have now expanded to Sirius XM and we're thrilled to be doing so. We do the show from Southwest Montana and I just moved here with my wife Gracie.

Let me tell you a little bit about her. She may join us later on in the show today if Ed says it's okay. Ed is producing us from Dallas. Ed, you haven't said anything on the show. Can you just say hello so people know that you're not there? I can say hello.

Well, there you are. And I am Peter Rosenberger and 33 years ago, I married a woman who was hurt. She had had a terrible accident several years prior. I didn't know her at the time of the wreck. And by the time I met her, she'd had about 20 surgeries. And I just saw this beautiful young woman and I thought, you know what?

This is an extraordinary woman. And I got to know her a little bit more. I heard her sing, which is extraordinary. And you'll probably hear it later on in the show to hear her voice.

I mean, it is just, she's a no kidding singer. And I was just amazed how this woman transcended what had happened to her. And I saw the scars and I knew, I mean, she had a limp, but I just saw this extraordinarily beautiful woman. And I said, you know, I'm gonna take care of this woman for the rest of my life.

And I had no idea what that meant to care for somebody who had a broken body. The surgeries kept mounting that I can count. We're up to 80 and about another 150 smaller procedures, maybe 200.

It's hard to count those. 12 different hospitals. We're now over a hundred doctors have treated her. Seven different insurance companies, well over $10 million, you know, getting ready to crest 11 million. It just keeps growing.

Doesn't zero any signs of slowing down. She lives with chronic pain. She gave up both of her legs below the knee and lives a very, very difficult life. And yet in the midst of that, she has overcome so many different things in her life. And I've watched this journey unfold now for over almost three and a half decades. And I've learned a few things about being a caregiver along the way. Being a caregiver for somebody who has relentless challenges. It's not something that kind of planes out, but it just keeps going and new things every day.

Whether it's dealing with prosthetic stuff, whether it's dealing with pain, whether it's dealing with pharmaceuticals, name it. Peter, are you back with me? Yeah. I'm sorry about that, John.

We did this last week. I hope I carry you. You didn't even introduce me before then. Would you like to be introduced now, John? I didn't introduce myself entirely in the grand way to which I am accustomed, but I hope that I didn't ramble too much. I didn't expect to have to fill that much time. Well, and I'm sorry. I was just going, but what happens is you're having to borrow some internet.

Right, right. You're 10 miles off the pavement. We're remodeling a cabin and so we're borrowing some internet and I don't know where we left off. Well, I don't know exactly where you left off, but you were telling your story. You were giving a brief rundown of why you're qualified to give a show about being a family caregiver. Well, it's my expertise on internet. Right, exactly.

That is the 100% reason why. I'm sorry. This is part of the challenge of doing this from Montana and it is what it is and sometimes it gets a little bit wonky and that's why I have you there, John, and thank you for being a safety net. No, no problem. I hope it worked out well, but you were in the middle of gushing about your lovely wife, so let me get you back on track with that. Well, and also, Ed, I want to give just a little bit of inside baseball while we're doing this because we are doing this from Nashville, Montana, and Dallas.

And Ed, if you don't mind, please just text me individually, not group text, because sometimes I have a hard time downloading a text. And I don't know why the internet just cuts out because it's been doing fine all week. Well, I can tell you why.

It's amazing that it works in the first place, so it's not unexpected. You are wise in these things. Well, I apologize for that, but anyway, yes, I will gush about my wife and she may join us a little bit later on in the show. And if you lose me, John and Ed, I'm terribly sorry. I'm trying to, I just keep blathering on and I realize I'm not even talking to anybody.

Yeah, I'll fill the time for you. No worries. God love you. God love you. But yeah. And so Gracie and I, after we got married, the surgeries kept coming.

80 now that we can count. And both of her legs gone and all these things. And so this is becoming a, it dawned on me after a while that there's not a place that we get to where this is going to stop and then we get on with our lives. This is our life as caregivers. This is our life.

How do you live this life? And I remember a counselor once told me, he said, well, I'd recommend a book for you to read, but you're the guy to write it. And so I wrote it. And the book is called Hope for the Caregiver.

The show is called Hope for the Caregiver. And I didn't write it as a kind of a how to care give book. I wrote it as a speak to the troubled heart of a caregiver. The dumpster fire that's often in a caregiver's heart.

And I really wrote it to my 22 year old self to say, hey, son, this is what's coming down the pipe. This is how you get ready for it. This is how you prepare for it. This is how you get ready for it.

This is how you prepare for it. And so when I did this, I simply wanted to speak to the the craziness that gets in our heart, the fear, the obligation and the guilt, what I call the fog of caregiving. Every caregiver goes through this, the fog of caregivers. Fear, obligation and guilt. And I've been talking about that a lot recently. And I'm going to spend a little bit of time on the obligation part of it today, because I think how can you tell if you're dealing with obligation? Well, you use words like I have to, I need to, I must. I'm supposed to. And I should be doing this.

All that kind of stuff. And when we do that, we know that we're in an obligation place and not in a place of being a steward. And I try to get myself and fellow caregivers to change that word obligation to stewardship.

Stewardship. I don't own this. I didn't do this to Gracie. I can't undo it.

So what's my role? Am I here to fix it? No, I can't fix it. I can't make legs grow back. You can't fight Alzheimer's. You can't fight cerebral palsy. You can't fight and change autism.

You have to accept it and deal with it for what it is and realize that you have a different role to play. But it's amazing how many of us try to fix something that cannot be fixed. But it's amazing how many of us try to fix something that cannot be fixed. If you've got somebody that's drinking and they're an alcoholic in your family, some loved one around you, you can't fix that.

You can't repair that. They have to walk in a recovery program and you have to walk in a recovery program. It's a chronic impairment. Well, it's the same thing with anything.

It's a chronic impairment. And your responsibility is to live peacefully with it in the midst of the craziness. And that's why we do the show.

Hope for the caregiver is the conviction that we as caregivers can live a calmer, healthier, and even more joyful life, even while dealing with the world, even while dealing with harsh realities. And there are 39,480 hours of programming every week on Sirius XM. 235 channels, 39,480 hours of programming every week. But this is the one hour for the family caregiver. And we're glad you're with us.

877-655-6755, 877-655-6755. And we do several things on the show. One of them is we do our caregiver tip of the day. I'm glad we got that worked out. If nothing else, we got that one, John. Oh, yeah.

Fantastic. Our caregiver tip of the day. And this ties into our obligation world that we're going into. Because fear, obligation, and guilt, the fog of caregivers.

But that obligation leads us in a place where we've got to do this, we have to do this, we have to do this, we have to do this. And we become very codependent in this world. And our well-being and our life is anchored in someone else's well-being in life. If mama's happy, then I'm happy.

And I fundamentally disagree with this. We're as happy or miserable as we choose to be. And so our caregiver tip of the day is this phrase right here. When a codependent dies, someone else's life flashes in front of their eyes. John, you may insert your laughter there. Oh, all right. Thank you.

It's a man. Well, you're absolutely right. There's no blame here. It's just kind of sad most of the time. Just kind of sad. But the thing is, what I'm trying to help my fellow caregivers understand is that you can have a life that is independent of the suffering. It is not severed from the suffering, but it is independent of the suffering. Well, it's a Venn diagram of your life. You have part of it that is bound up in this journey of being a caregiver.

But you're more than just this monolithic thing. And it took me a long time to understand that. You and I did a thing a long time ago of songs that caregivers should never listen to. Right, yes.

I do. Do you remember what the number one song was? Well, I don't remember all the jokes. No, it was, oh man, it wasn't like Harry Nilsson. Harry Nilsson singing, I can't live without you, if living means without you. I can't live without you. That is such a terrible song to listen to for caregivers. It's not healthy.

Yeah. And it's not to say that this is not a huge part of your life or that this is not an incredibly important thing. A lot of what we talk about on the show is, it seems a little counterintuitive, but if you say it flat out, it makes complete sense. You know, if you go down, what happens to the person you're taking care of, sort of thing?

You know, you have to be on your game. Well, it is. And as I rattle off the things that go along with Gracie's life, and I think about, okay, if I'm not in a good place, professionally, emotionally, spiritually, financially, you know, all the above, physically, how does this help her? How does this help her? And this is what I'm trying to help my fellow caregivers understand that it is not selfish. It is not some kind of weird, narcissistic path, but it is something that we as caregivers can understand that this is part of our life. That we have got to be responsible in this, and we've got to be good stewards of the one person keeping them from even worse disaster.

And so that's the journey. Do you feel codependent sometimes? Yeah, you do. But are you?

No, you're not. So that's our caregiver tip of the day, John. Absolutely. Well, I like that. You should make it a feeling, not a condition.

Yeah. And I look at some of the caregivers, what we do, and we tend to accept certain realities that we don't have to accept. And we fail to accept the ones that we need to accept. I need to accept the fact that my wife is injured and her body is broken. I don't have to accept the fact that I have to be miserable in this.

She hasn't. She's not miserable. Why should I be? You know, this is where we are as caregivers. And I see so many people, and I've talked to so many people who are dealing with it, and they live in that, again, that fog of caregivers. Now, what's the first thing you do when you get to a fog? John, what do you do when you get to a fog? Well, the last thing you do is turn on your brights. By the way, that was your introduction today, by the way. Your introduction was a man so bright that moths keep bumping into him. Oh, that's fantastic, sir. Thank you.

Yes, all right. What's your introduction, John? For those of you who are just now tuning in, I usually have an intro where Peter tells people why I'm even here.

Who is the strange voice that has suddenly intruded upon you? Well, and John's been with me for six years, and I do apologize for cutting out. It wasn't my fault. I didn't do it.

It was Ed. No, it wasn't. I'm blaming Steve Jobs.

No, it wasn't. I'm blaming Steve Jobs. Well, we had everything going perfectly. We're sitting here just swimming along here, and then all of a sudden the internet just goes out, and I'm just sitting there just blathering away. Talking to the wall, man. Yes, and then it just falls apart here, but that's live radio.

That's the whole point of this is to do a live show. But yeah, when you get to a fog, you slow down. Yeah. You slow down. The fog of caregivers, fear, obligation, and guilt, and this is what drives so much of us, fear, obligation, and guilt, and it leads to heartache, anger, and turmoil, and that spells out fog hat. Fog hat, because I like 70s music, and what was their number one single? Slow Ride.

Slow Ride. See how we tile that in? There's a level of brilliance to this show that is not heralded enough. I am just astounded. It is blinding. I need some welder's glasses just to behold some of these concepts that you're laying upon. Eclipse glasses. Oh, yeah.

I found my eclipse glasses the other day. But I try to do things that are in a simple way so that I can remember them, because I'm a simple guy, and I want to be able to hang onto those things that are crazy, because the fear, and the obligation, and the guilt will absolutely cripple us, and we're going to get into this in the next segment, but I want to spend a little bit more time before we go to the break on the obligation. Obligation will take you within seconds to deep-seated resentment.

It's really bad. And resentment for a caregiver is crippling, and you don't have to resent your loved one. You may end up resenting family and friends that don't help the way you want to help.

You may resent the doctors or medical providers who did things in a way that you didn't like or didn't do things that the way you would have liked. And I was listening to this comedian the other day, and he was kind of a, you can always tell the kind of the squirrely millennial type comedians, and he was kind of a nervous whatever. It's hard to describe it on the air, but you'd have to see him. But he was in line at a grocery store, and the lady in front of him cut him off. She cut him off or something and was real rude to about it, and he just went, and she turned around and flippantly said to him, and this is part of his act, you'll get over it. And his response was, you clearly don't know me very well. And he said, there are things that I have not gotten over since second grade. I will hold on to this for the rest of my life. On my deathbed, I will be crying out, it isn't fair, and then die on my last breath with that.

And it'll be like rosebud from Citizen Kane. What did he mean? What did he mean? You clearly don't know me very well, but that's the way we sometimes are. And we hold on to these resentments, and we get these resentments because we feel so obligated to this.

And my hope for you as a caregiver is that you will not hang on to these things because all they're going to do is keep you from living a healthier life. And they may have been really wrong things that were done to you. Forgiveness doesn't mean that it doesn't matter. That's not what forgiveness means.

It doesn't mean that it didn't hurt. What forgiveness is, is taking your hands off of someone else's throat so that you can live more peacefully no matter what happens. Release that to God. Let God deal with that individual.

He's much better at it than you and I are. That's forgiveness and recognizing that you keep the boundaries, but lose the grudges. You don't have to hold on to those things. You don't have to paralyze your own life with these things. The journey of a caregiver is a long one. It's an arduous one.

And you can stand on your head and hold your breath for several months. But when you get into this thing for several decades, man, this thing gets gnarly. And it will tie your heart up into knots. And it'll, it'll beat you down. And you will find yourself getting physically sick over things that you have no control over.

You follow, you're tracking with me? Let it go. Let's you and I live a calmer, healthier, and joyful life, even as caregivers. You heard what I deal with at the beginning of the show.

80 surgeries, both legs amputated. My wife has gone through a hellish experience. Still is. We're in it together. But we're not miserable. You don't have to be either. You don't have to be there. You don't have to be there. You don't have to be there. But we're not miserable.

You don't have to be either. We're going to talk about that a little bit more. 877-655-6755 is the number to call.

We're live on Series 6M, channel 131. 655-6755. This is Hope for the Caregiver. Hopeforthecaregiver.com. We'll be right back.

Hey, this is Peter Rosenberger. Have you ever helped somebody walk for the first time? I've had that privilege many times through our organization, Standing with Hope, when my wife, Gracie, gave up both of her legs following this horrible wreck that she had as a teenager. And she tried to save them for years, and it just wouldn't work out. And finally, she relinquished them and thought, wow, this is it. I mean, I don't have any legs anymore.

What can God do with that? And then she had this vision for using prosthetic limbs as a means of sharing the gospel, to put legs on her fellow amputees. And that's what we've been doing now since 2005 with Standing with Hope.

We work in the West African country of Ghana. And you can be a part of that through supplies, through supporting team members, through supporting the work that we're doing over there. You could designate a limb. There's all kinds of ways that you could be a part of giving the gift that keeps on walking at standingwithhope.com. Would you take a moment to go out to standingwithhope.com and see how you can give?

They go walking and leaping and praising God. You could be a part of that at standingwithhope.com. As a caregiver, think about all the legal documents you need, power of attorney, a will, living wills, and so many more. Then think about such things as disputes about medical bills. What if instead of shelling out hefty fees for a few days of legal help, you paid a monthly membership and got a law firm for life? Well, we're taking legal representation and making some revisions, in the form of accessible, affordable, full-service coverage.

Finally, you can live life knowing you have a lawyer in your back pocket who, at the same time, isn't emptying it. It's called Legal Shield, and it's practical, affordable, and a must for family caregivers. Visit caregiverlegal.com. That's caregiverlegal.com.

Isn't it about time someone started advocating for you? www.caregiverlegal.com. www.caregiverlegal.com. An independent associate.

Caregiverlegal.com. Have you ever struggled to trust God when lousy things happen to you? I'm Gracie Rosenberger, and in 1983, I experienced a horrific car accident, leading to 80 surgeries and both legs amputated. I questioned why God allowed something so brutal to happen to me, but over time, my questions changed, and I discovered courage to trust God. That understanding, along with an appreciation for quality prosthetic limbs, led me to establish Standing with Hope. For more than a dozen years, we've been working with the government of Ghana and West Africa, equipping and training local workers to build and maintain quality prosthetic limbs for their own people.

On a regular basis, we purchase and ship equipment and supplies, and with the help of inmates in a Tennessee prison, we also recycle parts from donated limbs. All of this is to point others to Christ, the source of my hope and strength. Please visit standingwithhope.com to learn more and participate in lifting others up. That's standingwithhope.com.

I'm Gracie, and I am standing with hope. Welcome back to the show for caregivers, about caregivers, hosted by caregiver, I am Peter Rosenberger. This is the nation's number one show for the family caregiver. We are live on Sirius XM channel 131, Family Talk.

If you want to be a part of it, 877-655-6755, 877-655-6755. And that was my beautiful wife, Gracie singing, Rejoice Evermore. You can get that record right now. It's on Amazon, iTunes, wherever all the stuff is downloaded. And you can also go to our website, hopeforthecaregiver.com and see all the music she's put out there, which is rather extensive. And she's got a new record coming out here next month.

If her producer can get it together. Oh, that would be me. I was going to say, was this a, is this a dig?

Is this a dig? Who do I need to talk to? Oh, I guess I know who I need to talk to. Yes, you do. And by the way, did I say channel 131? You did.

You said channel 131. Yeah. Okay.

I just want to make sure. No, no, no. I was just being silly and texting you.

Why are you doing that? Well, because I'm a silly person. You have to be a little bit silly in the midst of being a caregiver or, you know, we have to laugh. We talk about this all the time. You know, you do. And that brings me to a story.

Go ahead. Brings me to a story. My wife. And we have learned to laugh quite extensively.

This month, last Monday was Labor Day. And I went out riding horses and she went out on a four wheeler this time. And our friend Kathy was with us. We got some horses out here belong to her brother-in-law and we're trying to kind of whip them into shape a little bit.

They're a little bit green and I love to ride. And Kathy's a real no kidding Montana cow woman. And she really knows her business. And so we're out there riding, but I was reminded that one of the last times we were out here riding some years ago with Gracie. And Gracie has these prosthetic legs that have little buttons on the side and that when you press the button, that's when the leg comes off. Now don't get ahead of me, John. I'm waiting patiently and I'm not going to spoil your punchline.

Well, and it will go in a direction you can't even imagine anyway. So we were out riding and sure enough, the button got pressed on both legs as her legs kind of flopped against the saddle. Well, and so the legs popped off.

Okay. That's bad. But what happened was she was wearing straight leg jeans. The legs didn't come off. They got stuck in the bottom of the jeans. So it looked like she had like six foot long legs.

It was, it was a little bit freaky looking. Well, imagine what it did to the horse because these legs were beating against the horse. And so what did the horse do, John? Oh no.

And yes he did. And the horse took off and Gracie's really extra long legs were just hanging down in her jeans, were flapping the horse and beating the horse. And the horse was just terrified because I mean, in reality, this is not how a human is shaped.

Well, in equestrian school, the horse never learned how to deal with prosthetic legs flapping from a pair of jeans. And so Parker, our oldest son Parker, and I chased her down on our horses. We got her, we caught the horse and Gracie's screaming and hollering and everything else and holding on for dear life.

It was rather serious, but it was also, well, it was rather serious, but we can look back at it and laugh now. And then we took her legs off. Well, we're out there outside and she doesn't have her legs on.

She can't get off the horse very easily because she didn't have legs now. And I couldn't put them back on because we needed to be able to take the jeans off. Well, Parker's there and she's not going to take the jeans off there.

So we kind of pulled them all the way through the jeans. And then I carried one and led her horse back and Parker put the other one in the rifle boot of the scabbard of his saddle. So he's got a leg in the scabbard. And he's fuming all the way back.

I mean, he's just fuming. He's like, this is just, this is mom, you know, mom, mom. And, you know, and I've carried a leg and led the horse and we finally got her back, got her off the horse. And she was able to effectively put her legs back on. And the horse is still going to the horse psychiatrist. I imagine so. You want to lay down in the stall here, tell me all about it.

I hate Parker's mother. So that's, you know, that's just, that's our life. And speaking of prosthetic, oh, go ahead. I was going to say, well, this is, I've heard you tell stories about, you know, like, God help me if I, God help the police officer that ever pulls me over. I've got a trunk full of legs.

Well, I do. And I, we have a lot of legs that we have. Our house looks sometimes like a horror movie, but we do, we go through a lot of prosthetic legs.

What do you do with the legs when you're done with them? Because sometimes Gracie will outgrow legs. She's gone through lots of legs over, she's been an amputee now for 28 years.

She goes through a lot of legs. There's a song of that somewhere. I want you to think, I want you to think about that sentence and then write me a paragraph apologizing for what you've done here. But we want, we want people to understand that you can see humor in this. I mean, there are funny things that happen along the journey as a caregiver. And if you don't see the humor in it, stick with us on this show long enough and we'll help you because it's so important for you as a caregiver to laugh. It is really important for you to laugh. Yeah. And if you don't see the humor, you will burn out. Wait. Yes, you will. We'll be making a joke about you later.

You know, that's how it's going to work out. But when Gracie's done with legs that she no longer needs, we have a place for those legs to go. And if you know somebody who's an amputee, please, please, please write this down. Standingwithhope.com.

Standingwithhope.com. Some years ago, 15, 16 years ago, we launched this whole program of providing prosthetic limbs to Gracie's fellow amputees in West Africa. And part of that is we can recycle used limbs. Maybe you have a loved one who passed away and you don't know what to do with the leg.

Maybe you have somebody who, a child that has outgrown it or in Gracie's case, she's gone, you know, she's had to change legs over the years many times. Whatever the issue is, please don't throw those things away. Please don't throw the prosthetic socks away.

The liners, the sleeves, the belts, all that kind of stuff. We can recycle that. It goes to a local prison in Tennessee run by CoreCivic. And it's one of their many faith-based programs where inmates volunteer to disassemble used prosthetic limbs.

It's amazing. We call it Operation Footloose, as in turn that foot loose so we can recycle it. And we don't have footloose cued up, do we?

No, I'm not expecting it. But we take these limbs and we take them all the way down sometimes to the screw level, but the foot, the knee, the pylon, the adapters, connectors, all that stuff can be reused again. And then we'll build a custom fit socket that fits that patient's amputated limb and use those recycled parts.

And then they can go and have a better quality of life walking. They literally, we literally lift them up. I love in Acts 3, it says, when Peter and John were going to the temple and that beggar was sitting there, you know, I just thought about this Peter and John here on the show. And Peter and John were going to the temple at the gate called Beautiful. There was that young, I mean, that man that had been there since, you know, forever.

He was born lame and he was just begging for money. And Peter looked at him and said, hey, look at me. And he said, silver and gold have I none, but such as I have I give. In the name of Jesus Nazareth, stand up and walk. And he grabbed his hand and took him by the hand and lifted him up. And the guy started walking and leaping and praising God. We've done that. We have literally done that with folks. We have taken him by the hand and lift him up and say, just, you know, stand up and walk. And they do.

And they go walking and leaping and praising God. It's an extraordinary ministry from an extraordinary life. Gracie envisioned this many years ago.

And this Stadium with Hope is the presenting sponsor of this show. And the fact that we have inmates at a prison that does this with Core Civic, it's an amazing program. They let us do that. And the inmates volunteered to do it. They love doing it.

It gives them something positive to do with their hands. And they've told me that. I remember one inmate, when we first started, he said, look at me. He said, I've never done anything positive with my hands.

And another one said, I've never even thought about crippled people. And here we are doing this. So anyway, it's a great program, standingwithhope.com.

Would you take advantage of it and let people know about it. And if you're a funeral home or whatever, and if you have somebody that comes there and you don't know what to do, we'll take it. We will take it because we can give the gift that keeps on walking. Hey, let's go to Trinity in South Carolina. Trinity, good afternoon. How are you feeling?

Well, I'm just precious. How are you feeling? I'm feeling very good today. But the reason I called is I wanted to say thank you.

One of your shows, maybe it was six weeks ago, I think you were sharing about three things to think of. It might've been your caregiver minute. And the reason it meant a lot to me, and I'll actually get to the point, is that periodically I go and sit with my ex-husband.

My son is his caregiver. And the ex-husband has a touch of dementia, but he always remembers he does not like me at all. And I walked into the house and he flared at me and I responded. And it was, I think, three things to remember, and one of them was to drink a glass of water before you react.

And I have just flung to that because when I flared back, then I had to fix the problem. So just to pause before reacting, and I know better. But anyway, I just wanted to say thank you for that.

Well, you're quite welcome. And I get that because that's part of the thing I call Wait Water Walk. And Wait Water Walk is just WAIT. WAIT stands for Why Am I Talking? Well, it's because I'm breathing. That's why I talk. I'm a member of a 12-step class for talkers called On and On and On and On and On. Oh, how long have you been saving that one?

Oh, it's been in the back pocket for years. Don't you get sassy with me, John Butler. But it's, I get that. And I pop off, and Gracie will tell you, I pop off all the time and I say things that I shouldn't say. And sometimes we have to bite our tongues and learn to like the taste of blood. And when we drink some water, and John's a huge water drinker. I'm just a large person to begin with. Well, that's true.

He is so tall. He's never seen a sunset. But when we drink some water, it gives us a chance to kind of cool off and put something in our mouth besides words. Because when you've got somebody with a touch of dementia, who's your ex-husband, that is not exactly a recipe for a calm afternoon. No, but I do it so that my son gets a breather, that he gets a reprieve. It's not because I'm a good person. I mean, I'll just put that one out there.

I don't know, we need to go that far. No, no, no. I mean, because even if I'd heard that the three things before that event, I probably wouldn't have remembered at the time. But because it was so applicable, it's still in my head, because I've remembered it for weeks. And you know, I have a head injury. So I don't remember a whole lot. But it made that good an impression on me. And I just wanted to say thank you for that.

Well, you're quite welcome. And I do things, these simple things for a reason, not because I'm looking for people with head injuries to remember, I'm looking for me to remember. And I know me, and I know that if I make this thing too complicated, I'll get messed up. And that's why just these simple things like the fog of caregivers and obligation, fear, obligation and guilt.

And so, but weight, water, wall, just little things that we can remember. Because when it gets crazy, and it's not just for your loved one, I mean, it really isn't. There have been times when I've been in the hospital with Gracie when it is just really dicey. And you get nurses that it gets snippy, you get a surgeon that wants to come in there and just get all up in your business.

And sometimes you got to say things. But if you could say things in a measured way and not in a reactive way, then we're making progress. I knew I was making progress when I looked at a doctor who was giving me some lip with Gracie, and he was getting all up in our face about some stuff. And I stopped him and I said, you know, doc, and I wasn't mean about it, but I was firm about it. I said, doc, with all due respect, I was taking care of her when you were in junior high school. Let's keep this thing in perspective here, okay?

And you could just see him dial it back. But there have been times, though, when I would want to react and I wouldn't want to get mad. And that doesn't do anything with anybody, with ex-husbands, with doctors, with anybody. So. Absolutely. Well, you are. Thank you for taking my call. Well, you're quite welcome. Thank you for listening. Hello, John Butler.

Oh, hello, Trinity. It is always a pleasure to hear your voice. And I am glad that you remembered about the water stuff. Because that's the thing. You might have the snappiest comeback in the room and you might be the most clever. I know, because I am guilty of just, oh, I can see this clever thing.

We speak fluent sarcasm here, don't we? Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. It's bad.

Like, this is the best thing to say that's just going to ruin this person's day. And I just know it's there. I see it. And to be able to not do that is... Absolutely. Yeah, we've got to practice it.

And that's with everything. You get better at things by just doing it. You're not going to just think your way into it. Well, you're talking about adulthood, John.

And I've been avoiding adulthood for decades. Oh, understood. And well, you should. Well, listen, I do appreciate you... What is a great C.S. Lewis quote about that? Y'all have a good evening, both of you.

Thank you very much, Trinity. What were you saying, John? What was that C.S. Lewis quote? There's a great C.S. Lewis quote about that. And it's like, somebody said, you're an adult now, so you should give up childish things.

And there's something to be said for that. But I can't remember what the C.S. Lewis quote was, but word for word, because it's like a paragraph. He was a little wiser than I am.

I'm going back right now and doing the audiobook of mere Christianity, of his book, Mere Christianity. Those were radio addresses he did during the war. I didn't know that.

I didn't know that. I need to take a listen because he's... Yeah. It's really good. It's worth the time. Please do.

You'll like it. Yeah. Yeah. I want to circle back to fear, obligation and guilt. And I wanted to touch on this before we close up today about resentment and what that can do to an individual.

And I want to let you know, here's something I learned about resentment. We have these... See, my goal for us as caregivers, and you'll hear this often. Oh, by the way, I need to give out the number 877-655-6755. Ed wants me to do that periodically.

877-655-6755 if you want to be a part of the show. But my journey from this, as I've helped this with fellow caregivers and myself, is that to know that one day we're going to stand at a grave. That's the goal for us to stand as caregivers at the grave. We want to outlive our loved ones. I do not want Gracie to have to deal with this without me. I don't want my children and Gracie to have to deal with this without me.

I cannot promise that it will happen that way, but I want to live my life in a way that we give it the most chance, give it a fighting chance to. I saw a lady the other day. We were at the prosthetist's office. That's prosthetist, John. Prosthetist.

The people that make the prosthetic legs. Hey, look. By the way, you were talking about this earlier with the legs. If we have time, I want to circle back to that. So go ahead.

All right. Well, but we were there and I saw this man who was blind. Obviously, diabetes is the number one cause of amputation worldwide. And I saw this man who was blind and I think he was a bilateral amputee, both legs. And obviously it looked appeared like it was diabetes. And then his caregiver was pushing him in the wheelchair. And she was morbidly obese, morbidly obese.

And I thought, Oh, you know, I just, I just, I, I, my heart just hurt for her. And that's one of the, the seven caregiver landmines I put in my, in my book, seven caregiver landmines is excessive weight gain that we get as caregivers. Our hearts are so heavy that our bodies start taking on the weight because our hearts are heavy. And, and, and we got to live in a way that is, is healthy for us so that we can outlive them if, if, if at all possible. And that's what I want to do.

And I want to live my life in a way that's healthy period. But the goal is for us to stand at a grave, but we don't want to be standing there with clenched fist at ourselves and our loved one at God, at doctors, at, you know, pastors that didn't come to see us or whatever. There's so many people that we could be resentful for because we, we wear our feelings on our sleeves sometimes that there's no end of things that'll just tug at us. And we need to learn to let these things go. And, and the lesson was driven home for me that I don't want to be standing there with clenched fist.

I want to be able to be at peace with this. And I realized as a pianist, I cannot play a piano with clenched fist. I can't do it. And, and I can't push a wheelchair with clenched fist. Try it sometime, not with them in it, just try it sometime. You take a wheelchair out in the field somewhere.

Don't put them in it. What kind of wheelchair you got that you could take to a field. Here you have to have four wheel drive wheelchair. Of course, the way my wife carries stuff, I tell her, she's the only person I know there's a wheelchair with a trailer on it, but you know, but you can't push a wheelchair with clenched fist. And as a pianist though, I can't play music until I open my hands. I have to let it go. I cannot be so angry, so resentful, so bent out of shape about this, that it paralyzes me. And the only way that music is going to come out of my hands is if I let it, let them open up and let it go.

And then I can make beautiful music. And so my, my, my request to you as a caregiver is what music is not being played because of your resentment? What art is being denied to you and the world because of your resentment? What prayers are not being prayed because of you and your resentment? Can you let something go today? Can you let that go today? And if you don't know how to let it go, can you, can you, even a prayer that says, you know, Lord, I don't even know how to let this go. That's a start.

That's an act of faith. And I'm asking you for just a tiny, tiny step of faith to say, you know what, maybe you can live a little bit more peacefully without holding onto this resentment. I was talking to somebody the other day and, and she and her sister are trying to work this out with taking care of her mother, but her, her brother's just a real jerk about all this. And it's, and it's tearing apart families. And she's having to learn to let it go with her brother. We wish it would be different, but it's not.

So here's where we are. Can you let something go today? You don't have to, don't feel like you just got to go 100% say, oh, I'm going to do this. It doesn't make this big. Just, just one thing, just one small thing. Because if you can do one, then you can do two.

If you can do two, you can do four. You didn't get here overnight. You're not going to get out of it overnight. That's kind of the journey for us as caregivers. And so what I'm, I'm hoping that through this show that you'll, you'll laugh a little bit. You may cry a little bit because it's going to say things in a way that's going to pierce at those places in your heart.

It may be uncomfortable for some things, and then you may be able to learn a little bit. Regardless of which, we speak fluent caregiver here. That's what we do. That's what this show is all about. It's called hope for the caregiver. The conviction that you as a caregiver can live a calmer, healthier life, even while dealing with somebody who is in such pain that they can't function or is listlessly looking out a window as their mind is slipping away or somebody who is putting alcohol and drugs into their body on such a regular basis that they can't function normally in society and they're tearing their whole family and their world apart. Or a child with special needs that is screaming through the night.

Somebody who you're wiping their bottom and they're cussing at you. You can still be at peace in this. You can be. And there may be hot tears filling your eyes as you do it. But I am here to tell you that you can move to a safer place where even as those tears are drying on your cheek that you can learn to maybe laugh a little bit, breathe a little bit easier. That's why we do the show.

Hopeforthecaregiver.com. John, in the last minute or two, what were you going to say about about legs? We're going to talk a lot about legs about here. Yeah, we're going to talk a lot about legs.

Well, I mean, and that's called a leg way. Yeah. No, get out. Leave. Leave. You have been canceled, sir.

So, uh, no, there was a couple of, well, a couple of things. Oh, by the way, speaking of legs, speaking of legs, Gracie's in the studio audience listening out there. Gracie, if you want to kind of come in here, come in quietly. Don't come in here yelling and throwing things, but come in quietly. Say goodbye before we sign off.

Gracie. Go ahead, John. Oh, well, I was just saying like, when you were asking for leg donations and things like that, the reason it sounds like a weird thing because it is a weird thing, but think about how, think about how, uh, how frustrated you get when you lose a piece to your Ikea furniture. All right. If you have one thing that's missing from that where there's, it's ubiquitous, you can find a screw at, at, you know, uh, at Home Depot. Think about how frustrating it is if you need parts for some legs. So, you know, turn that foot loose. Oh, and you know, both, both of the shoes, by the way.

Yeah. Don't just send the one shoe that's on the leg. Send both of the pair of shoes because we got a lot of single shoes. Hey, Gracie, just joined me. Gracie, say, uh, say goodnight, Gracie. Goodnight, Gracie.

Great to hear your voice, Gracie. Hey, listen, this is Hope for the Caregiver. How are you feeling?

How are you feeling? That's what the show is about. We want you to be in a better, calmer, healthier, and dare I say it, a more joyful place as caregivers.

And you can do this. We're part of it with you. We want to be a part of that journey with us. Hopeforthecaregiver.com. The podcast is free. There's books, there's music, there's a blog, there's everything. Go check it out. Hopeforthecaregiver.com. We'll see you next week.