April 10, 2022
On how the sick person struggles with transition, and how to interact with a sick person, to assist them in their illness, and display the Love of Christ…
The sick person struggles with transition. For example, after being away from home all day, coming home may induce an energy crash. The person seemed just fine out and about, but on coming home, seems unable to speak coherently, speak at all, or make decisions. She may collapse into a chair, or wander around trying to be helpful, but instead getting in the way.
This is most detrimental when the sick person is a mother, or another person with heavy responsibilities in the household. Other people, including the father, may rely on mom for help in these moments of transition, and feel abandoned or manipulated when she is unable to give coherent or sensible responses.
For a teenager, the stress may involve them getting yelled at when they immediately sit down on entering the house to catch their breath. Their parent may ask impatiently, “What are you doing just sitting around?”
The teenager is unable to answer this question. To them, it is the natural thing to do, and they are obeying the impulses of their body, but now they doubt themselves, seeing that this is not normal for everyone else. Doubts arise in their mind: “Why am I so weak? I’m just lazy. I’m not paying enough attention.” They and their parents fail to realize that they are recouperating in this moment.
It is important to have rules and expectations in place to best assist this person in those moments of transition.
HOW TO SET RULES AND EXPECTATIONS
Have a conversation about the sick person’s basic needs. Write them down, and order by priority.
“I need to have a water bottle beside me at all times, because I never know when I’m going to desperately need a drink of water.”
“I need my homeopathic remedy every three hours. If I forget to take it, I will scream because of the leg cramps that I get.”
“I can’t stand after driving, because of my car sickness. After arriving home, I need to sit at the kitchen table and eat some chips with guacamole to calm my stomach.”
“It stresses me out when anyone asks me to make decisions within 20 minutes of arriving home.”
“My body goes into spasms when someone plays the piano as soon as we get in the door. I need the house to be in a calm state before someone starts playing music.”
After looking over this list, set rules for yourself and them:
Rule 1: On entering the house, Dad (healthy person) escorts mom (sick person) to couch, any time we are gone for more than 4 hours, regardless of how she feels in the moment.
Rule 2: Dad refills her water bottle, and brings her a bowl of guacamole and a bag of chips. (He does not ask her if she needs these things - he just brings them. If she doesn’t eat them, that’s ok.)
Rule 3: He asks if she needs her remedy, and brings it if necessary.
Rule 4: No one plays piano, or is allowed to ask mom if they can play piano, until an hour after she arrives home.
Rule 5: Only dad (or oldest child home) is allowed to ask mom questions, if they themselves are unable to handle the situation without her input.
This can seem like overkill. After all, there may be food in the car still which needs to be brought in and put away before it spoils. Why not just bring in the groceries first, or answer a couple texts, before taking these steps? But for the sick person, such a pause can seem interminable. If the sick person is ignored during the rush to put away food, their human dignity may be being violated. This is because they are incapable of meeting their own basic needs. Because they are incapable of caring for themselves in this moment, they feel alone and abandoned, just like a three year old who wants to untie his muddy shoes, or take off his winter coat, but doesn’t know how.
The good news is that implementing these rules is actually quick and simple. Once the rules are established, they don’t take more than ten minutes. And you are serving them with great dignity. The adult sick person knows not to cry because of their muddy boots, but on the inside, you bring them the same relief and happiness of the small child who is finally allowed to run free through the house.
Finally, if you’re worried about groceries spoiling in a hot car, plan ahead: pack a cooler and icepacks before going to the store, even if it’s just five minutes away. This allows you to put the sick person first, no matter what kind of emergencies might come up.
It is important to remember that the person is the most important aspect of any situation.
We know we should be considerate to others - this is something we all grew up knowing - but consideration for a sick person might look different than the standards that have been trained into us.
There are no set standards for the individual care of a sick person. Each person has different needs: one person may need salt-heavy foods, and one may need no-salt foods, but in spite of the differences in care, consideration is still possible in both circumstances.
Consideration means open communication, and willingness to change how you do something, when you learn that your first way of doing it was not helpful. It means a loving and adaptable attitude, open to listening and implementing.
You may have resistance to some of the ‘needs’ the sick person tells you they have.
There are two reasons for this:
They are blind to their own needs, and have misinterpreted the desires and emergencies that they are feeling.
You don’t understand the needs, and your misconception/misunderstanding is getting in the way of accepting the care they need.
I will address number 2 first:
You may have very strong preconceived ideas of what is or is not healthy, and this is often based on what is best for you, or what is culturally taught and accepted. For example, salt is bad, gluten is bad, and all fat is bad; soy is healthy, sugar replacements are healthy, and ‘diet’ is healthy.
But the bottom line is that, while there are some general standards of ‘healthy,’ every person is different, and sick people’s needs, for them, can be the difference between function and disfunction.