Are you helping or supporting your extended family? Are you raising a grandchild, niece, or family friend while the child’s parents get help? If so, you might be at risk for caregiver burnout.
Caring for a child with significant learning challenges, problematic behaviors, and complex emotional struggles is meaningful, compassionate work. It’s also exhausting and draining – especially if you struggle to find balance in your daily life.
What Are the Signs of Caregiver Burn Out?
The following are symptoms of burnout. We recommend that you consider each carefully and assess where you are. Do this self-assessment regularly and track your responses to the list of symptoms. For example, run through the list on the first Friday of every month to maintain awareness of your mental and emotional health. Gage your responses against last month’s and use that information to plan self-care.
7 Signs of Caregiver Burn Out
- Increase agitation, irritation, frustration, or anger over “small things.”
- Decreasing ability to maintain your patience or tolerance in caring for this child.
- Raising your voice to this child more often or more easily. Later, increased sense of guilt or shame about it.
- Neglecting or skipping parts of caring for this child that feel “too difficult.”
- Decline in your mental or emotional health. For example, you note an increase in anxiety or sadness or difficulty sleeping.
- Decline in your physical health. For example, changes in appetite, skipping your own regular health care, forgetting medicines, needing increased doses of medication, or skipping your weekly exercise class.
- Changes in your family’s dynamics since the child came to live with you. This can include several types of situations:
- The child’s behaviors impact the tone in the home.
- Your time and attention is spread too thin.
- Family members distance themselves.
- Responsibilities and household maintenance are unbalanced.
What To Do About Caregiver Burnout
As you may have read in other articles on this site, finding nourishing self-care that builds you up and refuels you for raising this child is crucial. Of course, it’s always best to establish healthy self-care habits to prevent burnout. However, if you are already at the point of burnout, there are several things to do immediately that can help.
1. Get Help
Asking for help is typically challenging for caregivers. After all, you are used to being the one that others ask for help. However, if you are feeling burned out, it’s time to access your support network and get some folks on board for help. Whether childcare, laundry, yard work, or tutoring, get a few folks around you to shoulder some of your load. Consider setting up a consistent schedule that you can count on so you can look forward to the feeling of “letting go.”
It’s helpful to remember that “get help” can also mean seeking professional help. Scheduling therapy, counseling, or educational interventions for both you and this child can make your load feel lighter, and both your needs will be met well.
2. Prioritize Yourself
It might seem like the opposite of caregiving to say this, but you must put yourself on the To-Do list regularly. Your doctor appointments are as crucial as your grandchild’s occupational therapy, and your book club meetings are as valuable as your nephew’s tutoring session.
Taking care of your needs – and wants – can be the fuel you need to keep going when caring for this child feels overwhelming. Put yourself on the calendar for small self-care events like your book club and the more significant appointments like your cardiologist.
3. Be a Joiner
Look around your community for a support group for caregivers. If support groups aren’t your thing, check out foster parent training in your community or a parenting class at the local high school. Even if these groups don’t feel like the perfect fit, they can be excellent sources of community and connection. You will discover you are not alone and learn new parenting skills to support you and your family.
Another opportunity to find community is by joining a hobby or skills-focused class. Many school districts or townships offer community courses on anything from baking to knitting to water aerobics. Joining a group of others with similar interests almost always boosts your mood and can open doors to deeper connection and support.
Find What Works and Keep at It!
Finding the right mix of self-care to address and prevent burnout can be a process. It would help to approach this like a shopping trip for clothes. You need some basics, like shirts, skirts, and pants. So, you shop the aisles, grab a few things, and try them on in the dressing room. This shirt fits, but you need a different pair of pants. Grab a few more options and try them on, too. You keep at this until you find what you need.
Looking around for the right mix of practical help, nourishing self-care, and community might take some time. And you might find that the mix changes as you heal and as your grandchild heals. That’s normal, and it’s healthy to assess the mix regularly, just as you assess yourself for signs of burnout regularly. Keep at it and take care of yourself—this child deserves the healthiest version of you that you can offer.