Hope for the Caregiver

Welcome to Hope for the Caregiver.

This is Peter Roseburger. I am glad that you are with us. This is the nation's number one show for the family caregiver here on American Family Radio.

We are thrilled to have you with us. 888-589-8840, 888-589-8840, millions and millions and millions and millions of people put themselves between a vulnerable loved one and even worse disaster. They do it every single day. Maybe you're one of those individuals. Maybe this is where you are. Maybe you have a loved one who is dealing with Alzheimer's or a child special needs who's dealing with autism. Maybe you're in the orbit of somebody who has an addiction, alcoholism, drug addiction. Maybe you are struggling with somebody who has a mental illness. Whatever the impairment, whatever the impairment, there is always an individual circling that that impaired individual and they're the ones that are putting themselves between that vulnerable loved one and even worse disaster. This show is committed to helping that individual to strengthening the family caregiver, the one who is up late at night doing laundry, mopping the floor, cleaning up stuff, preparing meals, back and forth to the hospital, back and forth to hospice, back and forth to rehab center, dressing wounds, making sure that the child does not get up in the middle of the night and just run off. This is what happens to family members who have a child with autism. Elopement is a huge issue. The child just gets up and leaves. And how do you sleep like that?

And there are ways that we talk about these were the ways to use technology to help with that sort of thing. But I mean, that's a real fear. They just get up and just leave. If we don't minister to these people, who's going to talk to them?

Where are they going to turn? And that's what this show is about. An American Family Radio is committed to helping that family caregiver who is just at the end of their rope. And we want you to know that this is a place where you could start finding real practical solutions. What we want to do is we want to back you away from that cliff, help you get to a place of safety, show you what safety looks like, give you the courage to ask for help. Once we give you the vocabulary, we want to give you the courage to do so to really inspire you to go ahead. It's okay to raise your hand and ask for help.

It's not going to come in every way you want, but we're going to start that process. And then for those who are not caregivers, particularly those who are involved in any kind of ministry, church related, pastor, whatever, we want to give the vocabulary of what help looks like to a caregiver. And we want to hopefully inspire you to offer that help. Friends don't let friends caregiver alone. And that's what we're about on the show. And it's hard enough to do this.

It's impossible to do it alone. And we speak fluent caregiver here. So if you want to call in and speak in your own native tongue as a caregiver, guess what?

This is the place, 888-589-8840. And I want to just quickly address something that's current in the news, this thing in New Zealand. And what's happened here again is just these mass tragedies that come out.

And we've had this ancillary effect. And I wrote about this. I do a regular blog contribution to American Family Association and their blog called The Stand. And you can go out there and see several of my columns.

And there's one of them, it's about a deeper constellation. And all too many times we tend to just put our, what we do is we just send this, our thoughts and prayers are with the families and victims. Our thoughts and prayers. You hear that a lot.

And even the left now is starting to push back on this. What good are your thoughts and prayers? I've been saying this for some time because it really, it's a nice button-up way to say something, but it's really not accomplishing the task at hand. When you live with something that is rather extreme in suffering, people's thoughts and prayers, that sounds very nice and meaningful, and it's sentimental and all those kinds of things.

But in reality, it doesn't, what thoughts? What prayers? What are you going to pray? Who are you praying to? What are you going to pray? You're going to talk to the great I Am, Jehovah Jireh, King of Kings, Lord of Lords, and you're asking what?

And you want that person who is suffering to do what with that information. My wife's missing both legs. What are you going to do?

You go pray for her legs to grow back? Is that what you're going to pray? This is the kind of thing that sends that message. Do we want to send that message?

I don't think so. Your thoughts and prayers are between you and God, and please pray. Keep them in your thoughts, but let's go specific. Let's go deeper and go back to look at James 2. This is the inspiration for this whole conversation.

Look at James 2.16. If one of you says to them, go in peace, keep warm and well fed, but does nothing about their physical needs, what good is it? That doesn't mean you can fix somebody's situation, but you can speak into that situation with great specificity and clarity, and you can offer somebody some tangible help.

Let me give you an example. A lady I know here in Nashville, we're doing this out of Nashville, and by the way, we are live, 888-589-8840, but this lady was taking care of her husband with a brain injury for about five years, and she was struggling and so forth, but then something happened, and her car broke down, and she finally worked up the nerve to ask somebody at church for some help. She said, look, I really need some help. My car just broke down, and I'm taking care of my husband. I just really need some help, and the lady was very kind at church.

She said, oh, we're going to pray for you, and I'm going to bring you a meal, and to her credit, this caregiver said to this woman, said, look, I appreciate your thoughts and prayers and your meals. I really do, but I really need a mechanic. A car doesn't work.

You follow me on that one? See, this is what happens a lot of times. We just want to kind of glibly offer something that we understand, but it's really important that we listen to understand what's going on with that caregiver, with that person in need. We can't fix the problem that they're carrying as far as the medical stuff. I mean, the woman's husband had a brain injury. I mean, you don't have to be a brain surgeon, but what you can do is say, okay, is the car working okay?

What can we do? I know a mechanic. You can ask them about specific things in their home.

I guarantee you, if a caregiver is frazzled, their home is frazzled, and there are things going on that need to happen there, and you can go very specific. The more specific you get, the better it is, and that's what this show is all about is teaching people how to go into those places. One of the things you'll hear me say over and over and over is, have you been to your doctor lately?

When's the last time you were at your doctor's office? And there's an article about me. If you don't subscribe to it, Jim, let me ask you a question.

Let me interrupt from this. Jim, if somebody wants to get on the mailing list for the American Family Association's journal, how do they do that? They would visit afa.net, and once you're there, you'll see divisions. One of those would be the AFA Journal, and if you want to go straight to that, it's afajournal.net, and they can sign up for a free one-year subscription to the journal. And you were mentioning your blog a minute ago.

That's available at afa.net forward slash stand. And the journal, you get a free membership for a year, and they have great articles in there throughout the year of various subjects, and I was really pleased to have an interview with Rusty Benson about this show, and he said in the article, what could listeners expect? And they can expect that we're going to ask about that listener. How are they feeling?

What's going on with them? And so you can read the whole article, and I think it's online as well. Hey, this is Peter Rosenberger. This is Hope for the Caregiver.

The number is 888-589-8840. We'll be right back. 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. How do you feel? Is your body sluggish? How about your mind? What about sleeping? Is that difficult for you? When you had your last physical, what did you learn about your health?

Should you lose weight? If you're like so many caregivers, those are hard questions. You didn't get here overnight, and you won't change it overnight, but there are steps you can take starting today. Find more information at ahealthierlifeforyou.com. That's ahealthierlifeforyou.com.

Welcome back to the show. For Caregivers About Caregivers, hosted by a caregiver, I am Peter Rosenberger. This is Hope for the Caregiver, and we are glad you're with us, bringing you. We have 30, gosh, I'm in my 33rd year of this. I've been a caregiver now for over 33 years, 12,000 days. If you count half days, that's over 120,000 hours.

That's a lot of time. I'm bringing all of that experience to help you stay strong and healthy as you care for someone who is not. How are you feeling?

888-589-8840. Hey, I got something new. I want to try that.

I'm asking for your help. I got something brand new that I'm doing, and I think we've worked out all the kinks of it. If we haven't, you'll have to be family, but if you go to caregivermeals.com, caregivermeals.com, at my website, we are trying to collect recipes that caregivers love, that they make, and to share them with other caregivers who are having to learn how to cook maybe for the first time. There's a way for you to upload a story about the recipe, why it's important to you, and a favorite scripture or a favorite verse, a poem, a song lyric, or a quote, or something that gets you through the day, as well as a picture of you and your loved one and your family, or the meal, if you want to take a picture of it and give everybody an idea of what it looks like. What we're going to do is we're going to... Now, we won't share your personal information, but what we'll do is we'll put the recipes out on a special page on our website so that caregivers who are finding themselves cooking for the first time, maybe ever, they haven't had to do it, but they're thrust into this role and they don't really know what to do, and we're looking for heart-healthy meals. Please don't try to put things with tons of butter and fat and sugar and all that kind of stuff, because that doesn't help us as caregivers.

We need to look for heart-healthy. A guy that's been really mentoring me, and you guys will know who he is, Graham Care, formerly known as the Galloping Gourmet, and he really changed his entire life around when his wife got... He was a caregiver for his wife for 28 years, and she had some real health problems, and he blamed himself. He blamed the way he cooked, because he cooked with a lot of fat and so forth, and so he changed everything, and he's on a real mission. He's been that way for some time to help people learn to look at food differently so that we can be healthier individuals.

It doesn't do much good if we're putting all this stuff into our body that's not helping us. So if you've got a recipe that you like, and maybe you could substitute something in it, maybe you're using cream and maybe we could substitute Greek yogurt for it, that kind of stuff, but it's a recipe that means something to you, go to caregivermeals.com, caregivermeals.com, and upload it, and if it doesn't work, I mean, it's not because I didn't try hard, I did, but I think it should work. I think we've worked out all the kinks of it, so I look forward to seeing what you're cooking and what we can share with other caregivers, because let me tell you something, cooking meals can get a little bit gnarly.

You're at the end of the day, and you're tired, and you just throw something together, and opening up macaroni and cheese out of a box kind of thing, that is no way to live, and I think we can make heart-healthy meals that are easy to prepare, don't require a lot of brain power, but they have a lot of great benefit to our bodies, and it's important for us to stay healthy, because we're taking care of someone who is not. All right, let's get to the calls here, and this is Aurora in Kansas. Aurora in Kansas, good morning, how are you feeling? Well, first, thank you for giving me this time, and every weekend I'm listening to you, but my English is not really, really good, I'm fried, because I really need help for my mom, but maybe you understand how my English is. Well, first off, let's back up. How are you feeling? I don't feel good, but my heart is broken for my family. I'm busy with my mom.

All right, let me see if I can do this right. English is not your native tongue, is it? Right, my Chinese is my first language. ¿Cómo estás? Bien, gracias, adiós. Pero, usted, this is su corazon es malo. ¿Qué está bompido, está triste?

Entendo, entendo. All right, now we spoke a little bit of Spanish just for you and me, but we got to let everybody else know we're speaking English, so you're sad, your heart is broken, tell us what's going on here. Okay, I have sister, and my mom, my mom, she's been living in San Francisco, California, like 53 years. She's married second time, and she passed away like my daddy, well, my mom passed away, she passed away like one year and a half, and she had dialysis, and nobody dated to her. She lived only for one year in her cell in the home, and my half sister, she lived in Texas. So you were doing all the work?

Yeah, I'm living here in Newton, Kansas. And so, kind of, what's going on with you today? Okay, my mom, she needs help, and she called my half sister, where she lived in Texas, and she go to, what is this year, in December, no, last year, September, October, she going to pick it up, my mom, to Placencia, to Texas. And she never lived with my mom, because she gave me that.

And how is that going right now? Well, she live with uncle, and she not love my mom anymore. She have 41 year now. So she's not, your mother, let me make sure I understand this so everybody can understand what's going on. Your sister, your half sister, your mother went to go live with your half sister, but she's never done that before, and now your half sister doesn't want to do this anymore?

Yeah, don't want it. My mom, she need help because I'm Mexican. Well, so where's your mother?

My mother, she, well, my half sister pick it up to California, she move to Texas. But where is your mother? Now, she's in Texas. So your mother is still with your half, so your mother is still with your half sister?

Right, right. But she's not happy there. So, can you bring her back to, can you bring her back to Kansas? No, because, suppose my half sister, she have a power zone, a POA.

Okay. And my mom, she talk to my sister every time she come into here with me. She speak only English, Spanish. She wanted to, I have tried to speak to my sister, my half sister, and she say, you know, you crazy, and maybe you be with my mom.

My mom, she have a house in Placencia, California. She sell, she sell everything. All right, so you're basically, let me cut right to the chase because I don't want to cut you off at the break here, but so basically, your half sister has kind of taken over everything and has sold your mother's property, and your mother is stuck with your half sister, but she's not happy, and you don't know what to do, is that correct?

Right, that's correct. She's walking because she don't really live with her, and she's walking. You know that, that temper, it's to call what she's walking. She love my mom because she don't want to stay with her, and she, somebody talk to her, and the police don't feel. Are you worried about your mother's safety?

Yeah, my mom, she's crying every time. My sister, she say they don't want her to feel no anymore in the nursing home because what I'm going to say to my mom, maybe she call to the police. Well, if you're worried about your mother's safety, there are organizations that you could call that can check in on her and make sure she's not going through elder abuse.

That's kind of a nuke, that's kind of a nuclear option. So, you could almost forget about having a positive relationship with your half sister once you pull that trigger, but that may, that may, if you're worried about your mother's safety, that may be the place and the way to go. And what I would recommend doing, do you have any type of access to legal or professional care of any kind? Do you have a, do you have, do you have an attorney that you could call? Do you have a social worker that you could call or somebody that affect because there are agencies in Texas, if there, if there's a suspected elder abuse, you can call them. And what they'll do is they'll go, they'll go check on things to make sure that your mother is not being mishandled. If you're worried about her safety.

Yeah. I have a lawyer. I have a, everybody and nobody, they say no. They wanted to go to Wichita and I go to Wichita.

No, I wanted to go to Texas for somebody. Somebody tell me, nobody tell me and I have. Well, it sounds, it sounds like your sister has done a pretty good job of locking everything up so that she's in control and you're going to have to fight two battles. It sounds like, and I'm trying to get a picture of what's going on. One of them is you're going to have to fight a battle to make sure that you can start getting control back of your mother's stuff. If that's something you think you need to do. And then the other one is you need to start probably with this first to make sure your mother is safe and well cared for. And if you think she's not safe and well cared for, then you need to go to the authorities and they have, I don't know where she is in Texas, but you need to go to the authorities and they have agencies that do that to, to call on elder abuse and they will, they will investigate this. I don't know how fast they'll do it and I don't know how effective they'll do it, but they are supposed to do it. And I've got, um, uh, friends of mine, uh, do you get on Facebook much?

No, no, no. Um, well, I'll put the link out on my website and on Facebook, uh, of some things. If you feel like there's elder abuse and I will, I will do some research and find out what, what's the best number to call in Texas and put that out on my website and the Facebook page, it'll be at hope for the caregiver on Facebook. And then you can go to hope for the caregiver.com and I'll put a little notice out there about a number to call for that sort of thing.

And that may be your first place to start a roar. Okay. Well, I wish I could be a little bit more help on this, but I don't know the whole story, but I think the first thing to do is let's just make sure your mom is safe and being cared for. Okay.

And there are places that you could call on that and do that. And I'll put, I promise I'll put that on the website today at hope for the caregiver.com. Hey listen, thank you so much for the call. Uh, this is Peter Rosenberg and we have to go to break.

We'll be right back. Watch advances a culture where human life is valued and religious Liberty thrives. Hello, this is Tony Perkins, host of Washington watch right here on the American family radio network, inviting you to join us each weekend for the weekend edition of Washington watch for the latest from our nation's capital on what is happening as it pertains to faith, family, and freedom.

You'll hear from policy makers, congressional leaders, and others each day, 4 PM central time. Be there. 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 purchased 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.

Four caregivers about caregivers hosted by a caregiver. I'd never get tired of hearing that song. I'd really just love that.

That is my wife Gracie with Johnny Erickson-Tada, and I just love listening to those two women sing. Oh my goodness. Well, Peter, one day you need to send me the whole song.

Oh, well, well, okay. And we'll let you play the whole song. And we can find that where? At hopeforthecaregiver.com. I have a whole music page there, but you could get the song, you could download the song from any of the.com streaming. I think it's on Spotify. Everything that's out there, it's out there.

I will get that to you. I just love it. And Johnny just finished up a pretty intensive bout of cancer for her second go around. And Gracie would sing songs to her on her phone and just send her clips of it.

And they would sing and Johnny would play it. And then she would FaceTime with Gracie and they would sing in harmony together. It was just really meaningful to watch these two women. My wife, Gracie, for those who don't know, 80 surgeries, both legs amputated. She was hurt when she was 17, just like Johnny was hurt when she was 17.

Several years apart, but Gracie was hurt back in 83. And so it's just really meaningful to listen to those two women encourage each other and strengthen each other and do it for us as well. Listen, I did some research. By the way, if you will be on the show, excuse me, 888-589-8840, 888-589-8840. This is Hope for the Caregiver. I'm Peter Rosenberger. And I did some research over the break and you could go, this is for Aurora.

Aurora, if you're still listening, I hope you are. There's an 800 number you can call in Texas to report abuse. Now, again, this is the nuclear option.

So you could kind of forget about having a decent relationship with your half sister after this, at least for some time. But it's 800-252-5400. 800-252-5400. And if you think there's elder abuse going on in Texas, that's the number to call for Aurora. And it's www.tx, like Texas, txabusehotline.org. And there's an online contact form you can use as well. That abuse, it's right there at the top of their webpage at the dfps.state. You just Google it. Unfortunately, they don't make easy website addresses sometimes in state government for things like this.

But the best way to do is txabusehotline.org. And Aurora, if that's what you think is going on with your mother, I would point you to that place because her safety is more important right now, even than your harmonious relationship with your sister, if you think that's what's going on. 888-589-8840, if you want to be a part of the show. This is not an uncommon situation that is going on with so many. And families become very fractured over who's going to do what. Man, I've gotten so many emails. I was on the 700 Club recently. And when you do a big show like that, you kind of get flooded with just heartbreaking situations.

And I was just getting a lot of emails. I've tried to still come out from underneath them and address these things as best as possible. But there's just so much out there where families are just coming to blows.

They are being just ripped apart over these things. And a lot of times it has to do with controlling the estate and the money. A lot of families will struggle with that. In fact, I got a buddy of mine who's a neurologist here in Nashville at Vanderbilt. And he deals with Alzheimer's and Parkinson's and Huntington's disease. There's three big areas where he deals with. But we were talking about this and he said that when the family gets a diagnosis of Alzheimer's, for example, the first question asked is, how much is this going to cost? That's the first question he said by far that most families ask, how much is this going to cost? And it's extremely expensive and the costs are more than just monetary, what it does to families and how it affects families.

And so then you've got somebody saying, well, they're not doing a very good job of this. There's just all kinds of dynamics that get involved. And I cannot stress enough to you, do not try to do this by yourself. There's legal help available.

There are social services available that you can do this. They're not going to move as fast as probably you would like. But if you try to do this by yourself, chances are this is going to go south on you.

This can be an incredible sticky wicket for you. And I just cannot stress that strongly enough. And it may just start with your pastor. And one of the things where you hear this a lot on my show is me pushing back to pastors, pushing back to the church. I am of the mindset that if the church is not out in front of this issue, then we are in real deep trouble. Because what is the world going to be saying?

Think about this. You've got a family with a special needs child that is pushing them to the breaking point. And I know people that are like this, that are having these kinds of difficulties. I had a family member, the child just screamed incessantly. I mean, this was just going on and on and on.

I mean, the family was just becoming just so frazzled over this. And when you've got a child with that kind of situation going on, what are they listening to? Who are they listening to? Are they going to listen to the governor of Virginia who is saying, you know, if a child with severe deformities is born, we're going to put it aside and then we'll have a discussion?

Is that who we're going to listen to? Maryland just yesterday passed another medically assisted death bill where they're allowing this. They're joining, I think that's now the eighth or ninth state.

I don't know. The numbers are starting to pile up. Hawaii, their law enacted at the first of the year, and now Maryland is following suit. And at least Maryland did this. There were lawmakers that were weeping as they were doing this rather than applauding like New York state legislator over late term abortions. But as long as the viability of life is being dictated by state legislators, we're down a dark path. And if the church is not out there speaking life into these situations and pointing people towards life and strength and fortitude, where's that going to come from?

It's not going to come from the state legislators. And this is what I'm concerned about. And you get these family caregivers who are thinking, okay, would it be better just for mama to go ahead and go, put them out of their misery? You just heard Johnny and Gracie singing Because He Lives. And at the last chorus, and you can go download the song, it's on iTunes, Amazon, whatever it is, go get it. But the two of them say together, because he lives, we can face tomorrow.

Because he lives, all fear is gone. Now, those are great lyrics that Bill and Glory Gaither stamped on us in every hymnal and everything else. But when a woman who's been in a wheelchair paralyzed as a quadriplegic and face cancer twice sings that, with another woman whose body is just broken and has gone through surgery, I mean, just 80 surgeries that I can count and lives with pain every day and both legs are gone, when those two women sing that, they're hearing life and they're communicating life in a way that the rest of us desperately need to hear.

What do they know about Jesus that we need to, that they could sing a song like that? You can't fake that kind of stuff. I've seen a lot of people who kind of skate by on stuff for a couple of months or maybe even, maybe in a couple of years. But when this thing stretches on for decades, like it has for Johnny, who got hurt at 67, Gracie got hurt at 83, when this thing stretches on for decades, you're going to need something more substantive to hold on to. What are you holding on to? As a caregiver right now, what are you holding on to? What is getting you through the day as you're watching somebody you love suffer or slip away or act out or whatever? What are you holding on to?

888-589-8840. Because if we're not pointing each other to something to hang on to, to grasp with everything we have, then what are we doing? And who are they going to listen to? I would much rather equip pastors to be able to speak life from their pulpits than to have these people tune in to listen to politicians like the governor of Virginia who says, we're going to put a child aside and have a discussion about whether or not we want to resuscitate or allow that child to live that has a severe deformity. Or state legislators who say, you know, if the pain is that bad, we're going to give you some medication and let you go ahead and just check out. A lot of people wouldn't want to live like my wife.

A lot of people wouldn't want to live like Johnny. Maybe some of you are in that place. But what I am imploring is that we learn how to speak with clarity, the gospel, into those kinds of situations. If we're not willing to go into those kinds of train wrecks of people's lives that are struggling with this, then what good is our Christianity? If we're not willing to walk into those kinds of heartbreaking scenarios with the clear, concise, and conviction of the gospel and speak with great authority into that, even if we're weeping while we do it, then I got to ask you, what good is your faith? This is not a country club religion.

This is frontline warfare. This is triage. People's lives are really, truly broken. And if the church can't speak into that and offer something for folks to hang on to, then you kind of have to wonder what good is all these wonderful, beautiful buildings that we've got around with these nice steeples and bells and great sound system and great worship teams and all that kind of stuff. I don't want to show up and see a worship team. I don't even really want to show up and see a pastor. I want to show up at church to see Jesus and hear this life-changing gospel.

I need to hear it every day so that I can better care for my wife, so that I can better live my life. 888-589-8840, this is Peter Rosenberger. This is Hope for the Caregiver. 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. Welcome back to the show for caregivers about caregivers hosted by a caregiver. I am Peter Rosenberger, bringing you three plus decades of experience to help you stay strong and healthy as you take care of someone who is not.

And we're glad you're with us. 888-589-8840, 888-589-8840. I want to squeeze in a few calls here. Janine in Texas. Janine, good morning. How are you feeling? Janine, how are you feeling?

Yes, I'm doing well. I just wanted to say I stumbled upon your program right by accident on Saturday morning on my way to work. We're used to that, Janine. People stumble by our program every day. We're used to that phrase.

Hand on our program. Well, our story is a little bit unusual. My son is about to be 40 years old and he was born at 26 weeks, he's a spastic quadriplegic and a double amputee. And now he has esophageal cancer. So we have been down a lot of roads and journeys that my husband and I did not plan.

We were really young and he was our first child. And I just want to say to tell people that even though things look impossible, you can do it. But I've learned to live in the moment and be grateful for each day and to hang on to the Lord with everything I've got. You know, Janine, you are why I do the show and you inspire me and what you and your husband go through, my heart is, I'm just deeply moved by this. And I tell you what I want you to do.

I want you to hang on and Jim's going to get your information. I'm going to send you a copy of my book, Hope for the Caregiver, and I'm going to send you a CD that I did called Songs for the Caregiver. And it's just music.

Gracie sings about half of it. I'm playing on it. And just some hymns and so forth. I can't do a whole lot for you, but I can give you this and I think it would be meaningful to you. And I just want you to know that I see the magnitude of what you're carrying and I want to do what I can to put my shoulder to the wheel of that. And would that be okay? Can I send that to you?

That would be wonderful. Thank you. And God bless you and Gracie for the work you're doing for amputees. Adam was born without either hand. He does not have either hand. And but with cerebral palsy on top of it, you know, we've tried all kinds of prosthesis over the years, but right now we're not using anything.

But he said it's in his way. I have found that a lot of people that are born with congenital limb loss, and that's when you're just not born with a hand or whatever, they don't particularly enjoy the prosthesis, particularly hands. No, they really don't. They really don't. It's cumbersome.

It doesn't feel right. And they don't have any awareness of having a hand. So it's not it just like I got a buddy of mine that I knew that was missing it below the elbow. And he felt like when he put on a prosthesis that his arm was like 12 feet long kind of thing.

Yeah. He just didn't care for it. Most of what we do in West Africa, we do with legs because we can get the bigger benefit of somebody walking with legs hands. We just technology just has not replaced, you know, enough of what God created in the first place.

You can't get that dexterity. No, but let me ask you one quick question that I got. I want to go and take another call here. But I wanted to ask you, when you hear somebody like the governor of Virginia say, we're going to put this child with the former over here to the side and we'll have a discussion. This is a loaded question.

There's no wrong answer. I'm just asking you, what was the reaction you and your husband had? Horrified.

Absolutely horrified. Because in today's society, they would have viewed Adam as a liability and just put him aside and say it would be better if he doesn't live. But he had a pediatrician the day he was born that spent three days at the hospital with him and flew a lung surgeon into the area. We were in a small town in Mississippi and flew a surgeon there to operate on him.

They went to extreme measures to save his life. And that wouldn't have had it any other way. Because people have no idea what a disability looks like a disadvantage, but it's really not. It's a blessing if you will let it be.

Anybody else that says that, I would think they had rose colored glasses, but somebody who has taken care of a child with severe disabilities for 40 years, that's kind of worth listening to, folks. What is a scripture that you hang on to when things get pretty rough? Jeremiah 29 11.

That's my go-to. Because he does have plans. Go ahead and say it.

Go ahead and say it. He has plans for us. And plans to not harm us.

And plans to progress us. And Adam is a happy person. He has blessed so many people. Even his cancer doctors. I don't know what he says to them, but they say if you go to a basketball game with his cancer doctors. He touches people's lives because just his attitude.

It's like you're Gracie and like Johnny Eric since. Their stories have been an inspiration to me. But finding a place where you accept what is and know that it's okay. And that's what I want people to hear.

It's okay. Well, I think they've heard it. I think that your attitude, Janine, and a lot of times we as caregivers, we watch somebody in our life who suffers and they're so inspiring and we are so excited about their inspiration. But I want you to know that I'm excited about your inspiration to me and to the listeners of this audience that you are willing to trust Jesus with the very difficult set of circumstances you and your husband and your family have endured and faced. And this is your why I do the show. So thank you. And thank you for listening. And don't hang up because Jim's going to get your information there. And I'm going to send you a book and a CD. I just want to do something for you that's going to bring you a little bit of strength and comfort.

All right. Let's go to Jackie in Texas. Jackie, good morning. How are you feeling? Hi.

Well, we're kind of in a crisis as of last night. We have a son. He's our only adopted son. And we adopted him at 11 months old. And we had him as a foster baby at 9 days old. So we're the only family he's ever known. And we have two biological children. And then we have older kids too.

But our biological kids don't struggle with anything like this. And he just has a severe addiction. He was born with crack cocaine. He was a great kid growing up. But then when the puberty years hit, we've just been struggling the last five years.

He just turned 18 February 11th. And the last two years have been so hard. And then so I didn't really see myself in a caregiver role. And I heard your program. And I thought, oh, my word. And then my parents are elderly. And they live about four miles from us. And so I'm kind of the go-to person for them.

My sister lives about an hour and a half away. But I got your book, the Landmines book. And that was really good. I think the one that hit me the most was the isolation. We stopped going to a church we'd been to for a long time because they knew, they were aware of the situations that we struggle with, but there is just no reaching out at all. And then we started going to another church and we've shared with them what we're going through.

No reaching out at all. I just, when you emphasize that, it just rings so true with me that, I mean, I'm really clinging hard to the Lord. I've been a Christian for a long time. My husband and I are just very supportive of each other. But I have a Thursday morning Ladies Bible study that's so helpful. I mean, we text each other at our prayer requests. And I know that they are so supportive of us. But it's just not having a pastor not feeling like you have a spiritual covering that I think is so important.

And we're just not finding that. So our son is in the Salvation Army because we can't let him come home. And so we're trying to just walk that fine line where, Billy, we love you, we're not abandoning you, we're not rejecting you, but we will not enable or rescue him. And so we got a call last night from the Salvation Army that they're kicking him out because he showed up drunk again. And so we've gone through so many counselors and therapists and residential treatment centers and all that for the youth.

But now that he's 18, it's a different story. Well, in the brief little time I have, because I don't want to have to cut you off at the top of the hour, are you going to any kind of 12-step recovery program for you and your husband? We were there for a while.

There was one here in our town. I would recommend that strongly. Huh? I would recommend that strongly, even if you don't necessarily theologically agree with a lot of things that are being said there. Yeah, I think that's where I struggle with, yeah.

I think I would put that in a box and put that aside because it sounds like you're strong theologically as you are, but there's some real benefit to being around people who are wrestling this with their own lives and strengthen each other on that. And I cannot stress to you enough how important that is. Okay. And there are, online as well, there's some things that you could check in with online. Okay.

There are so many resources, but I think that's the thing is when you and your husband get to a point where you realize you have to make it whether or not he does. I know. And that's kind of where we are at this point, it sounds like. Listen, I didn't get as much time to spend with you on this as I'd like. Keep listening. You can call in next week as well if you want, and we'll talk about this some more. This is a powerful issue that we want to continue addressing, and I want to make a big plea out to pastors and so forth that you've got to take this on. Otherwise, what good is your pulpit? Families are going through this kind of thing. Take it on. This is Hope for the Caregiver. This is Peter Rosenberger. I'm sorry to have to cut it off, but we'll be back next week.