Mom & Me Two Archive

    Last night as I was allowing my mind to whir down to a purr before sleep something occurred to me. One of the aspects of the media attention paid to caregivers that I never fail to find ironic in the subset of advice that I call the "Caretaker, Take Care... of Yourself" syndrome is the constant harping directed at caretakers to find someone else to do some of the "dirty work" in order for the caretaker to allot some time for her/himself. Aside from the fact that the more I find myself involved in caring for my mother the more obvious it becomes that in caring for her I am caring for myself, as some of you may have read here, the two times I did relent and have someone outside of family look after my mother for a mere hour each time I returned to discover that my mother had been dangerously neglected simply because the designated substitutes, both of whom were highly recommended and experienced, did not believe that my mother needed to have an eye kept on her at all times. Twice bitten, thrice shy.
    Last night as I was roaming through my brain data looking for reasons why intensely involved caretakers are being hounded to hire help by our society through both private and government sponsored commercials as well as private members of society I realized that this may be an effort to create jobs in a very shaky economy. If caretakers can be convinced that in the interest of their personal psychological and physical health they "should" be hiring help, well, considering that caregiving is becoming ubiquitous, an entire, robust industry can be created into which to shunt the unemployed. Forget that these people will probably be paid about the same as a counter jock in the fast food industry. Forget that their training will probably consist of little more than a familiarity with recently legislated dictates making various aspects of elder abuse a crime. Forget that money rarely creates the personal interest necessary to do justice to the role of caregiver. Forget that money is not creating a trustworthy professional health care environment, that it may be doing exactly the opposite. Let's see if we can't convince caregivers that professional help is necessary to their well being in order to get thousands of people off welfare rolls.
    Mind you, the two times I "hired out" my mother's care the people who were solicited both obviously had a heart interest in that vague desire to "take care of people". Didn't make a difference. How much less difference is it going to make if the bait is a paying job?
    Economy is, inagruably, one of the fundaments of any society. Based as it is in developed countries on an exchange of legal tender for work, it is not a reliable strategy for providing respite to caregivers and guaranteeing that this respite is not going to be harmful to the person in need of care. Nor is our current activity of legislating against neglect. I don't know any caregiver who believes that since caretaking neglect is now a crime the law guarantees that their charge will be safe and well treated. I don't know any caregiver who would trade a few hours of respite for the possibility of having to sue a professional caregiver for neglect. The caregivers I know are more suspicious than ever precisely because as a society we've found it necessary to highlight caregiving abuse to the point of legislating against it.
    If lawyers consider an ad on prime time television well worth the cost for offering their services in "going after" professional caregivers who've served up dangerous neglect, all I can say is that we're approaching the issue of caretaker respite from the wrong angle.