Being a caregiver isn’t all glitz and glamor, y’all. Sometimes, it’s hard work!

And yes – the more obvious “work” is the physical labor associated with taking care of another human. Something less obvious is the emotional labor we’re dealing with too. Who would have thought that thinking so hard could be so traumatic.

So, let’s hop on the magic school bus and take a trip through the tangled web that is my caregiver brain…

If you’ve never cared for someone else where the responsibility of their life, health, and happiness rests on your shoulders, it’s hard to understand how emotional labor can chip (and chop) away at your own life, health, and happiness.

I like to organize my unhinged thoughts into buckets: needs immediate attention, needs attention, and “that’s a tomorrow problem.”

Emotional entanglements that need immediate attention are things like – my husband is hospitalized and the staff hasn’t performed peri care or wound care today – I need to advocate for his needs. Or, when my bloodhound nose smells something, anything, that’s just off – is it just BO or is an infection brewing? Or having to remember which pills need to be dispensed at what time (because pill timing is vitally important, especially pills that can have a sedative effect). Or my personal favorite – my husband is acting ‘weird’ – is it his normal amount of weird or is an infection/relapse/oncoming seizure causing altered mental status.

Emotionally laborious tasks that need attention (but when nobody’s hair is on fire) are things like making sure to schedule appointments with providers or lab work and diagnostics. Remembering to refill prescriptions before the weekend comes. Or the one that seems innocuous, the back-track timing I have to do to get us somewhere outside of our home. Eg. Church is 30 mins from my house. Service starts at 10am. It takes 90 mins to help him get ready, and another 30 mins for me. That’s 2.5 hours barring any crazy situation that comes up – we need to be out of bed on Sundays at 7:30am, but really 7am to get there and park and get seated before the Gospel is read.

Tomorrow problems are things like – we have reservations for a restaurant this weekend, I hope they have accessible parking; our son is performing with his marching band, I need to figure out the best time to start getting my hubby ready so that we’re only slightly late to the football game, but early to the halftime show; and I wonder if we’ll have any call offs from therapy or home health this week.

This is a tiny snapshot of the caregiver things occupying time, space, and energy in my head. Add in the emotional labor for two wonderful and busy teenagers, and the emotional labor associated with a full time job – and you’ve got a toxic waste environment swirling around in my head.

If you know someone who is a caregiver, know that you’re in the presence of someone who’s doing double, maybe triple duty. They’re not just getting through the day, they’re constantly calculating, anticipating, remembering, coordinating, advocating, worrying, adjusting, and making decisions that most people never have to think about.

And while we may look like we’re just sitting at dinner, going to church, showing up at work, or cheering from the sidelines at a football game, there’s probably an entire command center running in the background – and that command center is in our brain.

So if your caregiver friend seems tired, distracted, forgetful, emotional, or just a little bit unhinged (maybe a little more than a little bit unhinged)…maybe give us some grace. There’s a good chance they’re carrying a whole lot more than you can see.