Minimizing Unforced Errors

This is Peter Rosenberger and I'm really excited to tell you about my new book. It's called A Minute for Caregivers When Every Day Feels Like Monday.

I compiled a lifetime of experience to offer a lifeline to my fellow caregivers. Each chapter only takes one minute to read them. I know I timed them. You can read them in order. You can read them out of order. You can flip to any page and you're going to find something on that page that will help you at that moment.

It's called A Minute for Caregivers When Every Day Feels Like Monday. Go to Hopeforthecaregiver.com slash book. Hopeforthecaregiver.com slash book. And you can sign up. We'll let you know as soon as it's available for pre-order. We'll send you a special bonus feature for it, sample chapter, all kinds of things. Go to Hopeforthecaregiver.com slash book. I can't wait for you to read this book. You're going to love it. Welcome to Hope for the Caregiver here on American Family Radio.

This is Peter Rosenberger. This is the program for you as a family caregiver. How are you doing? How are you holding up?

What's going on with you? 65 million Americans right now serve as a family caregiver. Maybe you've got somebody in your life that's elderly, somebody who has a special needs, somebody who has some type of chronic disease or impairment, somebody who has an addiction, somebody who has mental illness, whatever the impairment, there's always a caregiver. And as I often say, if you love somebody, you will most likely be a caregiver. If you live long enough, you will need one. So we all have some skin in this game, but how do you help a caregiver?

What does that even look like? And that's what this program is all about. And we're so glad that you're with us. Now, if you're not a caregiver, you'll get something out of this program, but I'm not here for you. I'm here to talk to my fellow caregivers and to share things I've learned along the journey.

I was just talking to a friend. I've had in my 37 years now of doing this, getting ready to start my 38th year, I've had ample opportunity to make as, I don't know about every kind of mistake you can make. Now I've repeated several of them.

Some of them were just one and done, but others were repetitive and still well. But along the way, I've discovered that there is a path to safety for us as caregivers. Now it doesn't mean it's a path to happiness. And I want to caution all of you and myself to realize that if we seek after happiness, and I've talked about this before, that's a very nebulous and often cruel pursuit. Happiness is based on things that make us feel good. But as caregivers, we live with things that regularly cause us heartache, distress, sadness, to be exhausted, pain, all those kinds of things. And so we discover along the way that pursuing happiness can be a bit disappointing. And I don't mean that as a downer because I think there's a better path.

I think there's a better plan for us as caregivers, and that is to pursue healthiness, to do things that equip us to stay, be, maintain healthiness. And physically, emotionally, spiritually, financially, professionally, and then in becoming healthier, guess what happens? Happiness overtakes us.

We don't want to go chase it. It comes after us because we're living in a much better manner, in a much better way, in a much better place. And so therefore we can learn to be, as Paul says, content in all things. And that's really what it's all about is learning to be at peace. That's the benefit of being in Christ is to be at peace, to realize I'm not at war anymore with myself and with God. Now, we still have the travails of this world, this broken, fallen world, but that's where you see that peace that passes all understanding. Jesus says, my peace I give to you, not as the world gives.

That's what all that is referencing. And so that's the path I believe that is much more appropriate for us to pursue rather than this whole thing of happiness. You see this on television a lot when people say, I just want you to be happy. I just want you to be, yes, good luck with that.

That's going to be a bit challenging. So all that said, I thought I'd spend a little bit more time following up on what I did last week with things that help keep us safe, things that help us stay healthier, help us avoid conflict, help us avoid, in sports they call it unforced errors. For example, in tennis, a return or service it's not attributed to any other factor than poor judgment and execution by the player. That's an unforced error.

That's on us. Our skill or lack thereof leads to an unforced error. In forced errors, we're getting outplayed, we're getting outmatched. And that's because somebody brings a certain level of skill or abilities or whatever.

Okay. Don't run too far down the road with the sports metaphor, but we want to minimize the unforced errors as much as possible. We can't control anything but our own thoughts, words, and deeds. We don't even control over other people's actions and behaviors, but what we can do is set up boundaries and strategies to be able to insulate ourselves from things as much as possible. We don't put on our seatbelt for the day we know we're going to have a car wreck.

We put on our seatbelt every day. And so that's one of the things I want to do. And last week I spent some time talking about, for example, telemarketers. We talked about that in the last program and the way it can hook people.

And then the other thing is people that come into the church and they come at you from that way and they want to have this word from the Lord from you and they want to kind of manipulate you. And there are things that we can do to protect ourselves from that sort of stuff. Because let's face it, we're dealing with hardships regularly as caregivers. So we're a bit vulnerable. And sometimes that vulnerability leads us to feel a bit desperate. So in our desperation, we'll glom onto anything that sounds like a ray of hope. And there are people out there that know that. And they want to pray on that.

And that's not pray as in petition God. That is P-R-E-Y. They are predators.

Emotional, financial, physical, they're predators in this world. And so it's important that we learn how to protect ourselves. I live in Montana. By the way, if I sound a little hoarse today, it's because we think there is an indication that spring may be on the way.

I know this is past Easter. We're supposed to have snow this week, but the weather is a little bit odd. So if I sound a little hoarse, I apologize for that. But I live way out here in the Rockies. Well, there are predators out here.

We have bears, we have mountain lions. Gracie and I came home one night from church and it was dark. It was in the wintertime. And I saw what looked to be a deer beside the road in the snow.

And I thought, well, that's... Because the colors were the same. And then the deer jumped up on one of the split rail fences and perched there. And I thought, well, I've never seen a deer do that. The deer turned around and looked at me and it wasn't a deer. It was a mountain lion. And it was a big mountain lion. It must have been 150 pounds. You know what I did? I stayed in the truck because I'm not a total idiot.

That's 150 pounds of murder. And you stay in safety. You don't get out and do things like that. You don't make an unforced error by getting out of your truck when there's a mountain lion right there.

And that's right there at the gate going into our home. I saw a video the other day. It was going viral. Some guy went up and tried to pull the tail of a moose. I don't know. That takes a special level of stupid because did you know that more people are killed every year by moose than they are by grizzlies?

Look it up. They're very aggressive animals. And we have a family actually that hangs around here and sometimes we'll get into the barn and I'll have to go and get the hay and feed the horses. And I have to be careful when I go into the barn because there may be a moose in there. And if you corner a moose in the barn where we store the hay, that moose only has one way out and you're standing in that way. So you follow me.

Unforced errors. We don't need to make them. We need to protect ourselves. We need to plan. We need to be prepared. We need to be aware. They got signs out here all over the place going into the National Forest. We're backed up to the National Forest and it says be bear aware. Okay. Be bear aware.

Well how is that different for us as caregivers? Can we be aware? I mean we've got all kinds of things out here. I mean when spring does come and I've heard rumors that it will. We've had a lot of stow this year.

At one point on the deck here I had over three feet of snow. No kidding. And so but spring does come I like to go for hikes and walk around. Well guess what? I'm not going out there unarmed. You know we have a massive amount of forest behind us here that predators come down from and they're a lot of these things are waking up and they're hungry and you know I'm not on the menu. So let's be prepared. Let's be aware. Let's be guarded on how we function because there are predators and they will hurt you and they will do things to you that take advantage of you and can cause you a great deal of stress and pain and heartache and financial loss and all of the above. All right.

It's just that simple. So we're going to we're going to go through over the next several weeks maybe some things like that and we'll talk about it and weave in some conversations just to help us stay a bit healthier because you know healthy caregivers make better caregivers. This is Peter Rosenberg and this is Hope for the Caregiver.

We'll be right back. Welcome back to Hope for the Caregiver. This is Peter Rosenberg and this is the program for you as a family caregiver. Hope for the caregiver dot com. Hope for the caregiver dot com and while you're there go ahead and check out the stuff on my new book that's coming out.

I think you're going to really like this book. It's called A Minute for Caregivers When Every Day Feels Like Monday. I just love that.

The reason I got that. This is embarrassing but I'll just go ahead and tell you all this. I think we've we've established that I will tell plenty of things that are embarrassing on this program to me but that's just part of it.

We're just family here. I was calling a doctor's office one day. It was a Friday afternoon and I had to pay a bill and as I am accustomed to doing I always ask people how you doing? How you feeling? And the lady answered me. She said oh I'm doing great. It's Friday and before I could catch myself I said Friday means nothing to me. Every day is Monday. And it was a little bit self-pity and it was stupid and I take it back.

But I thought about that. I reference it back years ago when I was coming up with the title for this book and I will give credit to where credit is due. Liza Gibbons. She used to host Entertainment Tonight.

I remember when I had her on this program and I had the caregiver keyboard out and I played the thief. She came on. And it was kind of funny.

Well at least it made me laugh. It made her laugh too but she she and I both are from South Carolina and she spent some time with me one day. We were having a conversation and I called her up and I said I'm looking at this new book and I'm looking at her title and she kind of helped walk me through the process of really come up with a great title because that's something I struggle with.

When I write commentaries, when I do all my articles and so forth, I have a hard time coming up with a cool title. So I give credit to her for that. I also asked her on the air did she like boiled peanuts which I know that nobody ever has asked her that but I did because we're both from Carolina. You know boiled peanuts.

That's redneck caviar. So I came up with this title. I write headlines for the Babylon Bee.

I won't tell you my name on there because I've used it. I subscribe to it and you can pitch headlines and I've got a couple of them published but I did this because I want to push myself to come up with better headlines. So when I came up with this title she thought it was a pretty cool title. A minute for caregivers when every day feels like Monday and so that's the title of this book and I think you'll like it. It's just one minute sections that you can read and there's not even a table of contents.

You just pick it up to any page and read it in one minute. You will have something that will strengthen you as a caregiver right then right at that moment. And that reminds me of a great safety tip. I love the snowmobile and our youngest son Gray and I were out this is some years ago back behind us here. We went way back up in the forest and the trails are groomed a friend of mine Scott grooms the trails and his father did it before him and he has a kind of a contraption he built that he drags behind his snowmobile and it just knocks off the clumps and then he'll take a chainsaw up there and cut any trees that have fallen over the trails. In the summer times the boy scouts have gone up there and they put trail markers where all the trails are. Now this is not a friendly place up there if you're a novice there's no lifeguard on duty and when I say trails yes there are trails but understand it is incredibly challenging in places and you will go over stuff that literally freak you out until you get used to doing this. So one time Gray and I were out there and it was very windy the snow was blowing everywhere and I missed the marker. I missed the marker and we just kept going we couldn't see very well and we found ourselves out in this field and I got stuck on my sled and it just kind of sinks down the ground you have to dig it out it's a little bit of challenge but I didn't know where to point to to get out because I was disoriented I didn't know where I was and I couldn't find the marker and it was getting colder and I knew roughly where home was I mean it was 10 miles away but it was 10 miles down the mountain through feet and feet of snow and it was getting dark oh I mean the sun was setting and it was not it was not an ideal situation and we couldn't find the marker and we had to hunt around so I didn't want to expend the energy to get the sled out and then get stuck again because I went off into the wrong direction we had to find where was the trail where's where's safety and eventually we hiked around and did it Grayson was grumbling at his dad a little bit and as you can imagine that's okay it wasn't his first time and it won't be his last but we found it and then we got the sled unstuck got up there to the trail and we're on our way but it was pretty dicey there for a while you know and it's hard to describe how vast this is out here and the the mountainous terrain and everything else you're not in a place where safety can get to you very easily he got stuck out here a couple years after that and I only had one machine that was working at the time so I couldn't go back and find him and he was supposed to be I said be back here at before dark and you know he was in his 20s at the time so he's not a young man I mean he's a young man but he's not a kid but he didn't come back before dark and so Grayson and I were getting very worried and and you don't get cell service up there and it's it was getting pretty dicey and and I I drove into the forest on a machine but not on a sled I didn't have a snowmobile that was working at the time to go up there and hunt him down and so I just went out there to see if I could hear him and maybe he was hiking back down or something at the first part of the forest where it's just more road but it's still covered with snow and this was several miles into it and it was dead quiet dark and when I say dark out here it's dark at night and so I called a neighbor friend of mine I said look I don't know what to do he's not coming home I don't know where he is and my neighbor got on his machine and he went up there and found him he had actually gotten stuck hiked about a mile in the snow to an old gold miner's cabin that people stop at a lot we've stopped there many times it's half buried in the snow and there's an old stove in there that you and there's firewood and he had had a fire going and was going to plan on camping the night there not intentionally but he would be safe and so got him home and so forth but you know if you don't know where safety is it's a pretty good chance you're not going to get to safety so you got to know where the marker is you got to know where safety is what does that look like for you and part of that is knowing the trail knowing the terrain okay he got stuck and he knew that cabin was there and he knew generally where he was and so he hiked over to the cabin where he knew that he could at least make a fire and he would be able to sit out the night and figure it out the next day we scouted around before we dug our sleds out simply because you don't have the energy reservoir to keep digging out of the hole and if you're still lost you've got to figure out where safety is so you may have to take a little bit of time to do a perimeter search to figure out where is that trail marker then you get yourself unstuck then you get to the trail okay I know how to get unstuck but I don't I know how to get stuck too and there's no point in digging out of one mess just to get in another one because you don't know where you're going and it could be a worse mess so get the lay of the land that's one of the first things you can do to protect yourself there are things out there that will hurt you there are things that will get you in trouble get the lay of the land make sure you're aware remember the sign I said last segment be bear aware be aware of where the trail is of where safety is and before you panic and spend all your energy trying to get out of one mess and only to get into another one let's get a perimeter search take the time to get a perimeter search get to safety catch your breath and then we'll we'll figure out from there my son you know made his way to the cabin because he knew that's where safety was he's still stuck the machine's still stuck he's going to spend the night without food and he can have water he can heat up snow but he would be warm until morning time and then we can figure out what to do at that point sometimes in panic mode which happens to us often we will freak out and make snap decisions when we need to control our breathing settle ourselves down and let's get the lay of the land don't doubt the power of inactivity of just being still and thinking it through your mind is the greatest asset you have that God has given you to reason things out to figure this out and you're not doing it alone you have the full weight of the almighty but he gave you a mind to use so use it to think through where you are sometimes we have to act in an emergency situation where you know time is the enemy the clock is ticking we've got to do it somebody's bleeding whatever seizing there's a medical emergency I get that in a car accident whatever but when you're stuck in someplace like I was with that snowmobile that is not the time to panic how many times have you ever made a good decision when you were panicked but we do that all the time and so we can get hurt even worse we can get stuck even more the reason the old saying out of the frying pan into the fire you know has been around for a long time we flop around on the frying pan okay we're free from that but now we're in the fire there's a spot in the forest where you can't take wheeled vehicles after a certain time of year during the winter time because that's where the snowmobiles go so I could have taken a wheeled vehicle all the way up to that point and hiked up to try to find him but I could have missed him in the dark it's pitch black so I would have made the situation worse so I had to wait and I had to seek the appropriate help which was my neighbor Kevin and he went up and found him almost immediately because you know he's not gonna go terribly far off the trail but everybody kind of meets at the cabin the cabin is miles into the forest but we all know where it is and so Kevin found him there and then they went over together and got the machine out and came on back down the mountain so sometimes we just have to be patient and wait because we're gonna get ourselves hurt there have been incredibly high stress moments in my journey as a caregiver and I am ashamed to say how many of those moments led me to react and panic and freak out and make terrible decisions and I some of them I still have to bear the brunt of you can make some bad financial decisions when you're in a panic did you know that so slow down catch your breath get the lay of the land and let's find our path to immediate safety maybe won't be permanent safety it'll just be immediate safety once I saw that marker on that trail and it was you know every bit of 50 to 100 yards away from me and snow is blowing everywhere but once I saw the marker I had a modicum of safety because I knew that's where safety was I still wasn't at the house I still wasn't by the fire I still wasn't having a bowl of soup but I knew I was closer to it because I had a path now I had a plan I had a direction same thing with my son once he saw the cabin he knew that he could at least build a fire and make it through the night then we'll go to the next step we'll talk more about this when we come back this is Peter Rosenberger this is hope for the caregiver healthy caregivers make better caregivers let's stay healthy together welcome back to hope for the caregiver this is Peter Rosenberger this is the program for you as a family caregiver we're so glad that you're with us thank you for joining us thank you for giving me this time just to share some things I've learned over the years of being a caregiver the pitfalls the snares the travails the challenges and even the victories did you know that you can live victorious while you do this we are already victorious by the way I wanted to circle back to something we talked about a couple weeks ago when I went down to Nashville to play the funeral for Mike Hill I can't remember if I told you this but if I did sorry it's worthy of repetition I since 1985 I believe all the funerals that I've played and I'll tell you why that one stands out just a second but all the funerals that I've played the piano for and there have been quite a few and it's usually at the prelude as people are coming in but in every service I have played victory in Jesus and I don't have the caregiver keyboard hooked up right now otherwise I'd play it for you I may have to figure something else out and do it a little bit later but I slow it down and I play it very deliberately and I've done that since 1985 now why do I remember that funeral because that was my uncle's funeral my mom's brother his name was Lee he had neurofibromatosis had a terrible disease and his wife Diane took care of Lee and she was the first real caregiver that I ever got to know and I watched how she dealt with this raised her two daughters and she still remains one of my heroes and favorite people in the whole world the way she handled all of that and she took care for years he was very sick for a long time and when he died I she asked he'd asked me to play actually he asked me he pulled me aside he knew his death was imminent and he pulled me aside and asked me to play their song and I did at the funeral and it was Laura's theme from Dr. Zhivago and I played that and then I but as the family came in I played Victory in Jesus because they had it and they still do and we do and so the victory that we can live in as caregivers has already been accomplished now we're going to walk through some of these very painful realities that we have to deal with and they are I know that you know that you know that I know that and I know that you know that I know that we know that okay we got it scripture is filled with passages that tell us to be strong to be courageous to endure to persevere to stand firm God knows we're scared God knows we're troubled God knows these things that's why he tells us these things the most repeated command in scripture is to fear not don't be afraid but that said we still have the victory and that's where our confidence comes that we as caregivers we have the victory now it doesn't seem that way sometimes it doesn't look that way because we're seeing as Paul says through a you know glass darkly I mean it's it's obfuscated we can't tell sometimes because we're looking at horrific things each of us do the reason you're listening to this program is because you are dealing with painful things the reason I'm doing this program is because I have dealt with and continue to deal with very very troubling heartbreaking things that's not going to change until he comes back and says we're done and until then we persevere endure and we keep the faith there's a reason Paul said at the end I have fought the good fight well that implies that there's a fight you know there's a reason we want to hear him say well done now good and faithful servant that implies is there's something that we need to be good and faithful at you know so these are things that we consider yes we have battles and obstacles and things that we're going to have to deal with but listen to what Martin Luther wrote and though this world with devils filled should threaten to undo us we will not fear for God has willed his truth to triumph through us the prince of darkness grim we tremble not for him his rage we can endure for lo his doom is sure one little word shall fill him that word above all earthly powers no thanks to them abideth and he's referring to the earthly powers no thanks to those earthly powers the word abideth the spirit and the gifts are ours through him who with us sideth let goods and kindred go this mortal life also the body they may kill God's truth abideth still his kingdom is forever does that sound like a a weak self-reflective self-actualization song or is that a spine stiffening song that helps us lift our heads and understand there's more going on here than we could ever imagine and that victory is ours it's been given actually it's Christ and we are in Christ by the way that hymn was a mighty fortress is our God and I will tell the story on Gracie she'll get mad at me but it was still funny she was looking up the lyrics of the hymnal we were music practice one night and she said it's not in this hymnal and I looked at her and I said uh mighty it's two words Gracie she was looking up a mighty fortress we're both raised in the south so a mighty is often made into one word a mighty it was a funny moment sorry sorry Gracie but it was funny and she knows it was funny so anyway that is a that is one of the greatest hymns ever written a mighty fortress is our God do we believe that a bulwark never failing and once we wrap our minds around that concept yes we will face these things yes we will face horrific things we already are as caregivers we already do every day many of us are in horrible situations but this is where our souls go to find rest remember I talked about this the last section this is where the safety is this is where the marker is we're not home yet but we know where safety is and safety is on this trail Grayson was safe in that cabin for the night he wasn't home yet but he was safe there he found his way to safety I got the machine unstuck and got to a place where I knew that I could catch my breath wasn't home yet we're not home yet you understand that we're not home yet so we cannot live in this delusion that somehow we can create heaven on earth we cannot we will not this is not our home as it is now we are sojourners we're pilgrims we're passing through this is what scripture teaches us now there will be a new heaven a new earth all the things that he's going to make new not all new things he's making all things new but we're not there yet but we can get to safety and there is no place safer than in what does scripture say the name of the Lord is a strong tower the righteous run into it and are safe that's a great verse for us as caregivers what is the name of the Lord how do we run into the name of the Lord well what are the names of the Lord well you've got numerous names Jesus is the most named individual and all of everything I mean he is he has more names wonderful counselor the mighty God the everlasting father the prince of peace and the government shall be upon his shoulder what does that mean the government should be what is the government supposed to do and I know our government doesn't do the things that it's supposed to do in ways that we would always like in fact that's why the founding fathers created this elaborate system we talked about this on the last program because they knew the heart of man was exceedingly wicked and deceitful you got to have people watching you watch over your back there why do you don't take two preachers with you when you go fishing because you take just one he'll drink all your beer that kind of thing you've heard that oh you've heard that joke that's funny I don't care who you are that's funny right there but no I mean you got to have somebody watch it we're all fallible deceitful people there's called accountability Jesus handles all of that he doesn't need anybody to evaluate him he doesn't need checks and balances he is all sufficient all in it God refers to himself in the Trinity but but you have different characteristics and different names and different attributes that are immutable to God these are attributes that he alone possesses that are sacrosanct to him that that cannot be changed cannot be given to us we we don't have those we are not eternal we are not omniscient we are not invincible we are not ageless he is and he refers to himself in this way and then you have words like El Shaddai God Almighty Adonai Lord Jehovah Jireh the Lord will provide Jehovah Rafa the Lord who heals Jehovah Nissi our banner these are the names of God that we can run into and are safe he is our banner he provides he does these things and we can trust him with this how do we know we can trust him how do we know this when we see the situation of the loved one we're taking care of and some of us have very dire situations Gracie and I do right now Gracie's having a hard time so I'd ask you to keep her in your prayers when I watch her struggle with these things how do I know that I can trust him that I can run to the name of the Lord and be safe well first off I'm not running there because I'm righteous I'm running there because of his righteousness I don't have righteousness my righteousness comes from him it was imputed to me from Christ I don't have it that is the one thing if you try to go to God on your own righteousness it's not going to end well and if you'll notice that Jesus saved all of his outrage for the self-righteous I don't have righteousness of my own but I have his and I can run to him in that and I'm safe and the reason we know we can do this it's always always always always always always the cross so when someone's freaking out as a Christian as a professing Christian and they're freaking out the way you do it is you point them back to Christ you always point them to Christ you run to Christ show me somebody with little faith and I'll show you somebody with little understanding of the cross show me somebody who seems to be unflappable stalwart strong and calm in the midst of craziness in their faith and I'll show you somebody who has a deeper understanding of the cross I look at the people in my life who have mentored me and cared for me and shepherded me through things and every one of them every one of them has a powerful understanding of the cross of Christ and in that they are able to remain calm they're able to remain confident bold even because they know they have the victory because of what Christ did and yes this world with devils filled may threaten to undo us God's truth abideth still the truth is is that he paid it all on the cross and we have the victory this is hope for the caregiver that is hope for the caregiver this is Peter Rosenberger we'll be right back. Welcome back to Hope for the Caregiver this is Peter Rosenberger and I'm so glad you're with us that is Mike Castile on the flugelhorn with me for my CD Songs for the Caregiver Jesus Loves Me and I just love that track I love playing that song part of the reason I did that song on the record was because of the whole identity thing we talk about for caregivers that's a big safety issue for us we lose ourself in someone else's story I knew that Jesus loved Gracie but did I know he loved me you know how many of you feel that way that you know that God loves others but do you know that he loves you did you know that he knows your name and that's why I put that on there Jesus Loves Me there's a whole story about me playing that song and all that I'll tell it another time but I wanted to wrap up today's program with one more safety issue go to your dentist I went to my dentist this week I was told to the hygienist and she said do you feel run down I said well yeah I'm a caregiver but she said if you do always maintain good dental hygiene because the bacteria that can get in our mouths and it can really affect our blood pressure hearts all these kinds of things it's extremely important so if you're feeling kind of run down when's the last time you went to your dentist I know you're looking at me say well Peter that's crazy well that's not the first time I've heard that but for today's purposes let me just say go to your dentist set an appointment for you and your loved one and make sure you're getting proper dental care make sure you're flossing regularly all these kinds of things because what that does is it gets the bacteria out from below the gum line exposes it to the air and helps you have healthier gums and keeps you healthy that stuff's not going to get better on its own you have to get it out and you have to keep them clean brushing alone is not enough I know that sounds basic but pretty much everything I do here is basic because I think those basics are what keep us safe those basics those fundamentals of our faith of our finances of our health all of the above those are the things that keep us on the road and out of the ditch and away from the cliff and all of the above those basics so make an appointment with your dentist if you haven't seen your dentist in a while there's no point in waiting any longer make that appointment get your teeth clean our bodies are compromised without good dental hygiene and as a caregiver I gotta ask you is this a good time for your body to be compromised how's that working if it is so it's amazing what something so simple as a dentist appointment can do for your life particularly as a caregiver so that's my tip for today as far as that go to your dentist go to your dentist and let's let's live a healthier life because you know why healthy caregivers make better caregivers all right I want to go to listener mail I got an email from a dear lady who is taking care of her special needs child and her resources are depleted she said would you talk about this on the program and I will I don't know all the details but I wanted to at least start the discussion I don't know what resources she has or does not have any longer whether if the child is no longer covered by health insurance and if that's the case there are Medicaid programs for minors particularly special needs if she doesn't have a house or or money to pay for a rent or home or whatever I don't know I don't know all the details she just sent a note through the website says please address this my resources are gone please talk about this so let's address the first thing health do you have health care if not there are paths for you particularly for your special needs child maybe a little bit more challenging for you personally but for your special needs child there may be a path in the Medicaid program in her letter she wrote that it's a special needs child I don't know if the child is over 18 or under 18 but if the child is under 18 there may be an opportunity to apply for Medicare benefits based on a parent's salary work history or whatever there may be some benefits involved both health care wise and financial benefits and I'm unclear as to the dynamics going on but those are things that others of you may be in that same situation can at least explore and there are people that help you with that and you don't really have to have an attorney but if you must have an attorney be very selective on that I navigated that particular journey without an attorney and some things are easier than others and I get that but be careful because an attorney is going to take a big piece of that pie if you apply for Medicare benefits based on your work history your spouse's work history or a parent's work history the attorney is not doing this for free I use a service that has access to a whole group of attorneys you can find out more about that at my website and it's been a huge life saver for me and I pay just a very very small monthly fee and it works for me if that's something that you would like to do feel free to go out there and get some more information on that but that's helped me because I can't afford to have an attorney on retainer but with this program I use I have a whole law firm on retainer and it's pretty awesome so that's something you might want to consider the other thing is is that you can hire a social worker and pay them by the hour somebody with a master's degree in social work who is very adept at what the community services are available within your area and as far as nationally as well that may be 75 to 150 dollars an hour and that may be something you might want to do and how do you find a good one well usually your doctor will know one or if you have a specialist child your child's doctor will know one most neurologists and so forth who are working with you know Alzheimer's patients Parkinson's patients so forth they have a social worker they either contract with or have in their office to help with some of these things because it's a big big challenge for families they don't know what to do that's a place to start if you have none of those available to you or you don't have the resources that I would probably start with your pastor and go to your pastor and if your pastor won't see you then you need to go to a different church but sit down with your pastor just lay it all out and say look here's what I need or you may not even know what you need you may not know the first thing yet and say here's where I am and just be very vulnerable about it and say here's where I am now the pastor may know some people in the church who are very good at financial planning and so forth I've had a guy here on this program that is very good at that sort of thing and he's willing to take your call his name is Hans Scheil and he's the founder and CEO go to cardinalguide.com if you want to know more information about him wonderful believer and he said when he was on the program he said look if you call me don't don't don't avoid calling him just because you don't think you have any money he made a plea to the listeners of this program when he was on he said let let me worry about that let me pray about that and let God lead me how I can best serve but at least give me the opportunity to look and see if we can't be of help and I think that he can and so I think that when you have a special needs child or any disability financial planning is a big part of this and so Hans Scheil and it's cardinalguide.com if you want to learn more about him and then you there's a contact thing on his website and and ask him say look here's where I am I'm out of resources I don't even know what to do may not happen but at least it's a phone call of somebody else who's a certified financial planner and is a smart guy has a long history of serving people in this and is a is a tremendous believer okay and he's got a podcast it's free you can go out and listen to it and if you want to listen to a bunch of things that he says before you call him but at least that's a resource so there are several places out there to start social worker pastor here's a certified financial planner that I've known had on this program licensed in all 50 states at least it's somebody you can just talk to I don't know all the circumstances that this particular listener is dealing with and I don't know all certainly all the circumstances that you all are dealing with but these are places to start when we feel overwhelmed we have to break it down into micro steps sometimes we're not going to be able to pay off our house tomorrow kind of thing usually we didn't get here overnight we're not going to get through it overnight but we can do the next right thing and that's pick up the phone and ask for help now those of you who are longtime listeners of this program know I don't usually give out a lot of advice and I try to avoid that because I can't speak to the myriad of circumstances that are out there and I can't tell you how to take care of your loved one anymore you tell me how to take care of mine what I can do is reinforce foundational principles okay and you get trained professionals in there to help you you're going to get told no okay there are going to be people just going to say no can't help you you're going to find dead ends but a no is one step closer to a yes persistence is the key now anybody else saying that to you that sound kind of pie in the sky I've been doing this 37 years so yeah this is how I do it and and I remember having this conversation with some medical people they wouldn't call me back and that we got we ended up having this meeting and I got scolded because I called so much and I looked at this person scolding me who I've been taking care of Gracie longer than she's been alive so and she was scolding me and I looked at her and I said I've been taking care of her since before you were born and I said when people don't call me back I keep calling because if something goes wrong with her I'm the one that has to clean it up are we on the same page now because you didn't call me back and she ate a little crow that day I wasn't mean but I was firm because we're going to have people like that in our life you're going to run up at this lady who wrote me she's going to have somebody's gonna tell her no but remember what Jesus said about the woman who kept knocking on the door to the guy gave her what she wanted I don't know if I answered all the questions but if you give me some more specifics we'll try to delve into it deeper this is simply our starting place this is Peter Rosenberg this is hope for the caregiver hope for the caregiver dot-com we'll see you next time you've heard me talk about standing with hope over the years this is the prosthetic limb ministry that Gracie envisioned after losing both of her legs part of that outreach is our prosthetic limb recycling program did you know that prosthetic limbs can be recycled no kidding there is a correctional facility in Arizona that helps us recycle prosthetic limbs and this facility is run by a group out of Nashville called CoreCivic and we met them over 11 years ago and they stepped in to help us with this recycling program of taking prostheses and you disassemble them you take the knee the foot the pylon the tube clamps the adapters the screws the liners the prosthetic socks all these things we can reuse and inmates help us do it before CoreCivic came along I was sitting on the floor at our house or out in the garage and when we lived in Nashville and I had tools everywhere limbs everywhere and feet boxes of so forth that I was doing all this myself and I'd make the kids help me and it got to be too much for me and so I was very grateful that CoreCivic stepped up said look we are always looking for faith-based programs that are interesting and that give inmates a sense of satisfaction and we'd love to be a part of this and that's what they're doing and you can see more about that at standingwithhope.com recycle so please help us get the word out that we do recycle prosthetic limbs we do arms as well but the majority of amputations are lower limb and that's where the focus of standing with hope is that's where Gracie's life is with her lower limb prostheses and she's used some of her own limbs in this outreach that she's recycled I mean she's been an amputee for over 30 years so you go through a lot of legs and parts and other types of materials and you can reuse prosthetic socks and liners if they're in good shape all of this helps give the gift that keeps on walking and it goes to this prison in Arizona where it's such an extraordinary ministry think with that inmates volunteering for this they want to do it and they've had amazing times with it and I've had very moving conversation with the inmates that work in this program and you can see again all of that at standingwithhope.com slash recycle they're putting together a big shipment right now for us to ship over we do this pretty regularly throughout the year as inventory rises and they need it badly in Ghana so please go out to standingwithhope.com slash recycle and get the word out and help us do more if you want to offset some of the shipping you can always go to the giving page and be a part of what we're doing there we're purchasing material in Ghana that they have to use that can't be recycled we're shipping over stuff that can be and we're doing all of this to lift others up and to point them to Christ and that's the whole purpose of everything that we do and that is why Gracie and I continue to be standing with hope standingwithhope.com