5 Tips for Managing Stress While Caring for Aging Parents
When you’re an adult caring for your aging parents, you might feel like you’re constantly playing catch-up, always responding to one crisis or another, whether it’s finding your mom a new home after she downsizes, helping your dad recover from a fall, or facilitating access to in-home care to promote independent living. You also want to keep up with work responsibilities, stay in touch with friends, maintain relationships with partners and kids, and squeeze in time for yourself. Balancing all these responsibilities can be incredibly challenging when you’re also trying to support aging parents.
It’s common for adult children who are also caregivers for their aging parents to experience stress because of this role. Below are five ways you can manage that stress and care for your aging parents and yourself at the same time.
5 Ways to Manage Stress as a Caregiver
Create a Support Network
If you’ve been caring for aging parents for a while, you may already have a network of family and friends who are aware that you’re in this situation. If not, start creating a support network by asking for help. A support network includes people you can talk to, go to for advice, and who can give you a break once in a while. It might include friends, family members, or professional support groups. It doesn’t matter who they are as long as they are people who can help you stay connected.
Create Routines
When you’re juggling caregiving and other responsibilities, it’s easy to feel as though you’re constantly reacting to a crisis. Making sure you and your parents have some type of routine, even if it is a very loose one, can help you stay focused for the long term. For example, take your parents to lunch and run errands on Tuesdays or help your mom with her finances on Fridays for a half hour. You can also establish a routine morning call to help them plan the day ahead. You don’t have to plan it all out on a calendar but having guidelines to follow can help you feel a little more in control as well as lower their anxiety.
Take Care of Yourself
Taking care of yourself is an important part of managing stress as an adult child who is also a caregiver. You don’t have to be perfect all the time, but you do have to make sure that you are taking care of your physical, mental, and emotional health. Some self-care activities include:
Making time to exercise regularly
Getting enough sleep
Eating healthy
You may not feel like you have time to see a therapist, but a therapist can also be incredibly helpful if you need someone to talk to outside of your family or support group. Equally as important as processing your feelings is making sure that you can do things that bring you joy. Scheduling a hobby, class, hike, or anything that makes you smile is an important part of self-care.
Set Small Goals
Caring for aging parents is a long-term commitment that can seem overwhelming, especially if you’re also juggling other responsibilities. Making sure that you’re setting some achievable goals and creating small wins along the way can help you feel like you’re making progress. For example, you might decide that this month you’ll help your parents clean out their garage or go through closets to donate items that are not used. Pick one activity that you can assist with or get someone else to assist with, so you can check it off the "to do" list.
Small goals are more realistic and achievable and help make the big goals like helping your parents downsize to a smaller living space much easier. There are always small, achievable tasks that can work towards your larger goal of helping your parents feel happy and live as independently as possible.
Ask for Help
Caring for aging parents is a huge responsibility, and it can be easy to feel like you have to do it all on your own. If you’re feeling overwhelmed, ask for help. It’s okay to rely on others for assistance, and it’s normal. Again, your support network can help you find other people in similar situations who understand what you’re going through and who can provide support and assistance when you need it. If you have financial resources, consider hiring caregivers who can provide support and companionship for your parents to give you regular breaks.
Start Now
Being an adult child who is also a caregiver can be stressful, but it doesn’t have to be harmful to your health. By creating a support network, establishing routines, taking care of yourself, setting small goals, and asking for help when you need it, you can manage the stress of caring for aging parents. Now is the time to start managing your stress and taking better care of yourself. Your parents are aging, and you want to support them as much as possible. Managing your stress early on will allow you to be more present for your family, and you’ll feel better about yourself throughout the process.
