EBook - WHY THE OXYGEN MASK ANALOGY NEVER WORKS

DISCLAIMER

The information discussed treatments or research mentioned are all for informational purposes only. I
am not a Psychology professional, I am a Mental Health Family Caregiver. I share what has helped my
family and me as I recovered from Depression and Anxiety. This eBook provides general information
based on my experiences during my journey as a survivor and a Family Caregiver.

Much of what we used to get through our toughest times was unconventional. I am a strong believer in
families doing whatever makes the successful. That means taking all factors into consideration as you
navigate this very tough road to mental health.

You as the survivor must decide what hits you in the heart and how you will use that information to
improve your life, or as a family caregiver, how can you use what you learn here to help your family on
their journey. Whatever resonates with you hold onto that, discard whatever you don’t feel a
relationship to. It’s all about your family and what makes you all successful. You know your family. You
know what would work and what wouldn’t.

I share here in this eBook what worked and didn’t work for me. It’s not a suggestion as to how you
should proceed with your journey, only a testimony of what worked for me and my family.

Whatever experiences that relate to real or made up individuals are purely coincidental and no names
have been used to protect the guilty.

PREFACE

I wrote “Why The Oxygen Analogy Never Works” because so many family caregivers including myself get
so tired of hearing, “…you need to put your own mask on first, before you can help your loved one.” As
much sense as that analogy makes, it is very difficult to think rationally on very little sleep or full of
frustration.

Self-Care is such a hostile word sometimes to caregivers because we understand how very little time we
do have. I talk about my experience with burnout, which is a very real issue for mental health family
caregivers.

When I began my journey there were no mental health family caregiver resources online. They were far
and few before. As a result I started reading other caregiver blogs but they had very different concerns
than we as mental health family caregivers have. We deal with psychosis, non-compliance, and mood
disorders.

At some point in our lives we will have bailed out a loved one literally and figuratively.

This book should be read by mental health family caregivers, those who support them, and the loved
one being supported.

My hope is to eventually have Psychology professionals to recognize the signs of Caregiver Burnout and
either address them or offer to treat them.

I have over 3 ½ years as a mental health family caregiver. Lots of trial and error, success and failure has
gone into supporting my son. I have watched him grow so much from feeling powerless to empowering
himself to get and keep his job.

My experiences as a family caregiver allows me to bring hope to other mental health family caregivers
who may be struggling with the care and the care demands of their loved one, and needing hope for
brighter days.

Our self-care is very important. If we don’t take it seriously then no one will.

It’s no mistake that you stumbled upon this eBook. It’s time to start paying attention to you and what
your needs are. Your loved one may not feel comfortable staying with someone to allow you to have
time alone to replenish, and then think about the condition they would be in if something happened to
you? They would be with someone anyway, either you are proactive and planning or being reactive and
taking the crisis as it comes. One after another. Make the choice before you have to, or worse yet, are
unable to.

WHY THE OXYGEN MASK ANALOGY NEVER WORKS
SELF-CARE: A CAREGIVER DILEMMA

La Shawn L. Splane-Wilburn

Published by ANCHORLife™
“Keeping Loved Ones Anchored.”
A Recovery Oriented Coaching Program

For
Caregivers & Families of Mental Health

eBook Edition
Copyright ©2016 La Shawn Wilburn

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any
form or by any means including photocopying, recording or other electronic or mechanical methods
without the written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in
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HOMAGI LLC
WWW.HOMAGI.ORG

DEDICATION

To me, I love you. We survived. Thank you for standing up again, depression didn’t beat us. Thank you for
your resilience and willingness to change. You have so much left to learn, live, and experience, but most
of all thank you for giving up fear. All of your hard work is going to pay off. We will use up all of our
talents and multiply for Jehovah. We are going to be just fine. Keep praying. Keep walking.

To Wil I love you. Thank you for your love and emotional support it has been priceless during this journey.
You have held me up and financed our dreams throughout this process and I am forever grateful for you.
They didn’t break us baby. We held on and we are still here. You are the best husband a girl could ask for.
I thank Jehovah for you every day.

To my Lindsey I love you. Thank you so much for your commitment to staying the course and keeping me
accountable to you and to myself. Thank you for keeping up with your end of responsibilities in school
regardless to how tough it got at times. I’m grateful for the blessing God gave me in you.

To Aaron I love you. Thank you for letting me tell your story and ultimately our story. Thank you for your
strength and for never giving up. You kept me in line and reminded me you were still your own man. You
helped us help you. Keep fighting baby. God gives his hardest battles to His strongest warriors. Keep
praying. Keep walking.

To Chris I love you. Thank you for standing in the gap for your brother when he needed you to. Thank you
for helping me and dad when we needed you most. You are a wonderful father and keep fighting to be
the best man you can be. God is going to bless you just keep going. Keep praying. Keep walking

To Joe I love you. Thank you for being there when you could. It’s been tough but you have held on. Keep
fighting for your dreams, all of your hard work will pay off. I pray for you often. One day you will see
Jehovah’s hand has been on you all along.

To Mary I love you. I pray God keeps his hands on you always. One day we will see our family whole
again.

To my family thank you for all you have taught me and for loving me, I love you.

To all my family members gone on to be with the Lord I pray Jehovah one day blesses us to bring about
what we all tried to be, a Family. I’m “yet praying.”

Acknowledgements

So many people have influenced our journey we are grateful to all. This eBook is the first in a series and
my hope is that it brings relief to other family caregivers in their hour of need. I hope the experiences I
share here help you to get through and encourage you to begin a life outside of caregiving.

To the psychiatrists who helped my son through his toughest times both the positive and the negatives
in those experienced served us.

To Dawn M. Greene thank you for your support during a very tough time for our family, the one
question, “Have you asked your son what he wants…” is one that changed the course of our journey
forever. You reminded me how important dignity and independence is during this journey to mental
health. You showed me living a normal and healthy life was not only possible for him but required lots of
hard work and living with purpose. I am forever grateful.

To Brandon of “Break Yo Stigma” thank you for your story of your family’s journey, you helped me to see
other families lived through and fought through. You gave me hope for recovery for my son and gave me
a bird’s eye view into what a man feels during this journey. We will forever be grateful.

To the many other people I have met via social media who have shared experiences and professional
advice I appreciate your help.

To all who gave an encouraging word, email or text thank you.

Thank you to all the Caregivers who allowed me to help you and in turn you helped me too because I
was able to stop focusing on my own troubles as I recovered from depression and anxiety. I healed as I
shared and relived very difficult moments during this journey.

If you have ever joined a Periscope broadcast, liked a post, shared via Twitter, Facebook or Instagram,
you helped to spread awareness and give hope to someone who read my post that would have
otherwise never received it. Thank you.

Table of Contents

I’m Not on a Plane .………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… Page 1
I Won’t Crash and Burn …………………………………………………………………………………………………………… Page 1
Every Day Is A Trip …………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… Page 1
Gotta Get Away? ………………..…………………………………………………………………………………………………… Page 1
Planning the Escape ……..………………………………………………………………………………………………………… Page 1
I Left My Baggage ………………….………………………………………………………………………………………………… Page 1
Arrival ……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… Page 1

I’m Not On A Plane

Want to piss a Caregiver off? Share the “Oxygen Mask” analogy with them. Ask them to put on an
oxygen mask. I believe the only thing worse than such a request is telling them to call the insurance
company to negotiate with the insurance company for a prescription that’s about to run out, is part of
their job!

If there is one thing a Caregiver will agree with you on is there is never enough time to get done all that
is required of us at the end of the day. Sun up to sun down and while we are sleeping, we are working
…yes even in our dreams we are busy.

Very often a caregiver day dreams about the “Caregiver Fairy” who will pay us a visit and fill out all the
paper work for consideration or to see if a new piece of medical equipment is going to be approved by
the insurance company...to get up and take over our duties when we would like to sleep in on Saturday
morning. She never shows up.

As much as people believe Family Caregivers are just belly aching about not having enough help and
having to do it all ourselves, and accusing us of just wanting to do it all and not ask for help that is really
not the case.

Caregivers are a special type of people. Every caregiver I have met was willing to give the shirt off their
back to a stranger and would give you half of their coffee or the cup if there was nothing to pour it into.
Seriously. Family Caregivers are very loving and compassionate people. The problem we face is family
members and friends who are oblivious to what we are going through or worse; don’t care because it’s
not affecting them directly. We have family members who are so intertwined in their own affairs, that
they don’t realize the amount of care a loved one needs until they are in the house visiting and see us
running around like a chicken with its head cut off and then they ask, “…do you do this every day?”

It’s not always about our families and friends not showing up. However, it can also be the caregiver was
already estranged from the family and has a limited to no social base. Because of the strained
relationship they have, it has caused them to isolate themselves or become afraid of rejection so
reaching out to say, “I need your help!” is not an option; at least that’s what they think.

Then there is the Family Caregiver who doesn’t have family and is the sole family member of the loved
one they are caring for. They could be an only child, a couple who are only children, or have friends who
may still live active lives and not understand the fullness of the responsibilities the caregiver has; not
wanting to burden their friends down with the “details” of their lives that have changed, and depending
on the diagnosis may change forever. Whatever the situation is, one fact doesn’t change; we caregivers
need help and we don’t know how to ask for it. We don’t need useless analogies to explain to us why or
how important getting help with our loved one is. Help us to identify why we are not asking for help,
and then guide us in a manner in which we can begin to seek out the resources we need and to actually
use them.

I Won’t Crash & Burn

While lying in the hospital bed, my heart raced. What was going to happen to my daughter? How would
she get ready for school, and who was going to feed her? Who was going to feed my husband and son?
I’d just fussed at my husband for trying to spend the night on the sofa in the hospital. I knew he had to
be at work by 4AM and it was already 11PM. My daughter and son, who’d just arrived home from
college, having suffered a sports injury while at his NFL pro day which would end his college football
career and his dreams he’d worked so hard for to go to the NFL, were still at the hospital as well. He and
my middle son, who was struggling with his diagnosis at the time, had lost his job where he was a
manager for an IT company and was on the verge of possibly losing his apartment, were having
arguments daily because my youngest son wanted my middle son to “start acting right and quit stressing
mom and dad out”. I was so worried and couldn’t understand why mental illness was so difficult and
even more so watching in horror as it tore my family apart, and worse…was producing the same results I
was hoping to stop in a generational curse of dysfunction…causing division and destroying my family.

I asked my son who was 23 at the time, to take my daughter home so she could get rest for school in
the morning. My husband was uneasy about leaving but I insisted. Things were getting very unstable at
his job with people getting laid off. He was one of the maintenance engineers/electricians at a pipe
manufacturing company, so he worked on high voltage machines with large moving parts, and my
concern was his safety if he wasn’t well rested. Little did I know how important that job was about to
become.

I’d left work early that day, because I was feeling dizzy and couldn’t catch my breath, as well as having
nagging chest pains. Under normal circumstances, I would have called my husband to come pick me up,
instead of driving feeling so ill. I didn’t want to stress him out and risk him losing his job for leaving early.

At work there was extreme pressure! I’d come to work for a company that was in the process of
restructuring. I had interviewed with them before, but was told by the head Administrative Manager
that I wasn’t a good fit for the company; “You’re way too structured for us, I think you would do better
in a corporate environment we are just a distribution center…” I was denied the position. I was working
for the director of a well know research university hospital and was told I would go permanent and just
as I was going through the process of becoming official I was informed that a “RIF”(Reduction in Force)
employee was being considered for the job and would be given priority should she decide to take the
position. I would later train her for a month before being released. I got a call from my recruiter to “re-
interview” for the company I would be working for when I had my first anxiety attack. The individual
who had interviewed me previously had lost her hiring privileges for the position and a new Regional
Manager was in place and would be doing the interview. I interviewed with him and respected where he
was moving the company as I’m a visionary, and understand how streamlining processes can result in a
well-oiled machine and increased production.

Not everyone agrees or wants new software and training when the “old way is working just fine”.
Coming into such a hostile environment was not uncommon for me as my recruiter knew I had a knack
for working with “difficult” people. I wasn’t prepared for the blow back that would come as a result. In
hindsight I would have declined to re-interview with such conflict already in place. Nonetheless it added

to my stress level as a family caregiver. I would eventually resign from a very good job but for very good
reason…my health was more important!

I share that story because family caregivers all over the world share in some form or fashion. My arriving
at the hospital with chest pains and difficulty breathing to me was the result of my job stress. I was
handling my caregiving responsibilities well. I’d been to my doctor’s office for two months straight off
and on complaining of various ailments all were worsening. My doctor actually suggested I find a new
job. He shared with me how another patient was experiencing the same problems and eventually had
to leave her job at which time her health improved tremendously. I sat there thinking with all of the
obligations we have and the insurance I have it was necessary for my son to get treatment so I couldn’t
leave.

I have spoke with so many caregivers who were in the same place I was, the same place my family was,
and very stressed out but unable to leave their jobs because they needed the income and the insurance.

We don’t think we can crash and burn. All of the things I worried about that night in the hospital were
very manageable, however at the time they seemed mountainous. My husband was helping with
cooking where he could, my youngest son was helping with various chores and my daughter was
keeping her things in order. To this day I’m amazed at the grades she made during what was one of the
most difficult life experiences for us all. My need to be at the front and in control of everything and
working a high stress job sent my stress level over the edge resulting in anxiety and later depression.

As caregivers we don’t want to burden others down with asking for help or relinquishing some of our
responsibilities to other family members. Sometimes it’s because we feel like they already have so much
to do and don’t want to burden them with more. Sometimes it’s shame because we feel like, especially
when it’s a parent with an adult child, we really don’t want push back from family members who don’t
understand what our loved one is going through or how difficult living with and managing a mental
illness truly is. As a survivor of depression and anxiety I understand how much “elbow grease” goes into
recovery and how much maintenance is required on a daily basis.

Family caregivers are some of the strongest, most resilient, most patient, and compassionate people you
will ever find. Those noble characteristics are also what put us at risk for “Caregiver Burnout”. Not
asking for help, or not acknowledging the fact we don’t have to have it all together in order to be
affective places us in the “ripe position” to neglect our health both mentally and physically.

How do we manage our lives as caregivers and still handle the life commitments we face outside of
caregiving like our self care, marriage, parenting, work, and social life? It requires a level of respect for
all of them. It requires giving attention to them all at some point in our day. It requires us to live more
deliberately than we did prior to mental illness coming to live with our family.

Putting the energy into the right areas at the right time requires first surrender. We must surrender the
idea we can be all things to all people including ourselves. The act of surrender is an act of love but we
see it initially as an act of selfishness. Not caring for our loved one or relinquishing some of the
responsibility for their care brings about guilt. We are shirking on our responsibilities in our minds and
therefore deserve to beat ourselves up daily with negative thoughts and blaming ourselves immensely

when something goes wrong, because of course if we hadn’t given up the responsibility things would
have went differently.

I once thought that way myself. There were multiple reasons why I changed my way of thinking, but for
the sake of page real estate in this e-book I will share only a few. One was obviously my hospital scare
where a believed heart attack was actually an anxiety attack, and I was placed on medication and
warned I may have to go on hypertension medication if I didn’t manage my stress and anxiety better.
The other was when I realized after having an email conversation with Dawn M. Green who I’d met on
Instagram and who changed my caregiving journey forever. I was asked how much of what I was doing
included my sons input about what he desired for his life.

I’d re-assumed the role of parenting a teenager in my mind because of the level of struggle my son was
experiencing with coming to terms with his mental illness, and how much partying and drinking he’d
taken up instead of working and being responsible like he once was. I’d taken away all of his identity and
pinned on him a label, the label of his mental illness. Instead of asking him I was making decisions for
him and treating him like a teenager which I later realized was causing him even more stress and
resulting in him suffering with symptoms even more so.

The moment I started looking at him as my son with an illness and not the opposite it changed my
caregiving experience. Instead of reading what other caregivers were doing I started reading what
people who were managing their lives and living with their diagnosis were doing and how I could help
my son versus tolerate him. My research took on a whole new life and so did my education about the
illness. Instead of getting online and complaining about the mania I began looking up why it happens
and what can be done to ease the symptom. I shared what I learned with my family and educated them
on the illness as well. It wasn’t easy in the beginning because all they could see was he was out of
control and being selfish and should take accountability for his actions. I knew differently because he
was starting to respond to what I was doing and what I’d learned from my research.

We have to change how we feel about asking for help as caregivers. Once I enlisted the help of family
and educated them on how to handle certain things and they used what I told them and it worked they
were on board fully. It took longer for some to get it but the amount of support and love that my son
began to feel was immeasurable. He no longer had to feel like the black sheep or the outcasts when he
had an episode and was feeling shame and wanted to hide in his room, family said, “…no…we love
you…and we aren’t going anywhere no matter how hard you push we are right here. Period point blank.

Asking for help is not a sign of weakness it is a sign of wisdom and strength because you understand you
can get more done with more help, you can be more effective with more input and the more people
involved the more love our loved one feels. Increasing the help increases the support and
encouragement for our loved ones with mental illness. As a survivor my families support and
understanding as well as reassuring me I was loved and appreciated in spite of my struggling helped me
to feel whole and to feel encouraged. I felt empowered to try and to fight.

When you ask for help you are empowering both you and your loved one, you are empowering your
family. You are giving your family a chance at living a life you all will come to appreciate much more and
one you can evolve with. The beautiful gift that mental illness can bring is the surrender of perfection.

You come to realize it doesn’t have to be perfect to work. It just has to work. Stop looking for the
destination and enjoy the trip there will be so much that will bless you in this journey that you will see
life in a whole new light. It shows up in blacks, whites, and greys some days, and on others it’s in
Technicolor.

Every Family Caregiver has their own story and each need is different for every family. Finances may be
one obstacle for a family who may not have lots of members in it or willing to help members in it and
therefore may need to hire outside help from professional caregivers. The family may consist of one
individual who can care for the loved one with no other family members and professional or volunteer
caregivers may be all they can afford or have access to. There are many programs and subsidies that
may cover the costs of your needs you have to be willing to do the research or to hire a company or
organization that can assist with locating the resources for your family which will get you started on your
way to living a life you can wake up and be satisfied as well as happy with. It happens in stages. It
happens with lots of hard work and with dedication to a greater purpose like the happiness of your
loved one as they endure the trials and tribulations of living with a mental illness or with a loved one
who is battling an illness such as Dementia which aside from the symptom of mental illness is terminal.

The quality of life for everyone involved in the support of a loved one with a mental illness increases
exponentially once everyone surrenders to the new life. When the new way of living and thriving is
respected and nurtured.

Every Day Is A Trip

If you want to be entertained sit with a Family Caregiver as they reminisce about the many times
throughout their day when they have to do a reality check to be sure they are not in a virtual world. As
insensitive as that may sound it is the life that we live as a family caregiver. Having a loved one who may
spend a great deal of their time in psychosis or paranoid can make for a very interesting life for someone
not experiencing the symptoms.

So many caregivers I have talked to have shared the same sentiment, it all comes down to not taking
what is said and done to heart. It comes down to remembering what is happening could possibly be a
sign of the illness and therefore doesn’t count.

For many of us that is very difficult because we care for loved ones with mood disorders and that could
mean on a daily basis or at least once a week we could be privy to a few name calling sessions, accused
of stealing or plotting with doctors to steal thoughts or place them in a facility. It could mean finding
creative ways to help calm a loved one down who believes someone is watching them through the
window or listening to them through the walls or a host of things a loved one experiencing psychosis
may be experiencing.

Many time our loved ones themselves can find humor in something they did and share with us that we
had no idea and we can all laugh about something that may have been very traumatic in the beginning.

What is most important is that we respect our loved ones and what they are experiencing. It’s not for us
to say what is real and what isn’t because what is happening to them feels, tastes and sounds real, and
learning to respect that is part of our journey as family caregivers. It helps us to be a sense of surety and
an Anchor for our loved ones to the real world when everything they are experiencing is out of control,
it helps to have someone who is in control and calm.

Various caregivers experience their own level of stress from the juggling of caregiving duties, suicide
watch, self harm investigator, tick monitor, recovery specialist for the things lost or locating a loved one
who has gone “rogue”, to investigating drug use or drug paraphernalia. Then there is the car tracker for
the times when your car is on the run with your loved one. The financial advisor for a “hostile” loved one
who may have difficulty managing their monies but despises being told what to do with it…including
paying rent and utilities so the loved one can remain independent.

Some caregivers must play the part of the loved ones recollection of a time in their lives they are reliving
as a result of Dementia and in an effort to reduce the stress of their loved one they must assume the
identity of the person the loved one is seeing when the caregiver is with the loved one.

PTSD caregivers have stories that are horrific at times, like waking up to being choked or to a loved one
having night terrors, or being verbally assaulted in addition to threatening physical posturing throughout
their day.

Caregivers for eating disorders may find themselves monitoring the trash cans for binge eating,
monitoring the bedroom for food hidden instead of eaten. Tracking down horrible smells that are the
result of food being stashed instead of eaten. Weight fluctuations and a host of other care demands a
caregiver might encounter with a loved one with an eating disorder.

Caregivers of loved ones with self-harm may find themselves checking the bodies of their loved ones or
questioning as to why the loved one would choose to use a fork to carve into their thigh or arm and a
host of other terrifying self-harm occurrences they may experience with a loved one that is equally if not
even more disturbing to a loved one they are caring for.

Caregivers who help loved ones with social anxieties can throughout the course of the day find
themselves calming down their loved one who is having an anxiety attack as a result of needing to go to
a doctors appointment and having been prepared up to that point of the week or day to leave the
house. It can be equally frustrating for the caregiver who could eventually begin to exhibit signs of
anxiety themselves. Secondary patients are what they call caregivers who began mimicking or
experiencing the symptoms of their loved ones illness. That can also include psychotic symptoms which
is why a caregiver maintaining a life outside of the home and outside of caregiving is so important.

A family caregiver can experience more before 5AM than most people experience in their whole day. I
told one person who asked me as what It’s like being a caregiver. We learn to see the lighter side of the
traumatic things we encounter on a daily basis, which is why talking to and meeting up with other family
caregivers is a must for every caregiver I believe. You need other people who know what life is like living
with and supporting someone with a mental illness as well as you need the company of people who
don’t, they both will serve you. Your caregiver friends give you the freedom to talk about cargiving and
find comradely. You friends unfamiliar with mental illness you can share and educate but they can keep
you anchored in the world outside of caregiving.

Every day is a new adventure in the life of a caregiver who lives full time with a loved one batting a
mental illness, as well as a part time caregiver who assists a loved one who may live on their own
because we never know what the phone call could go like when we get one. One think we all remember
is that we love the person that we are caring for enough to be there for them, and if we need to get,
adopt or keep a sense of humor to get through that then so be it.

This caregiver journey is about doing whatever makes us successful. We are always mindful of the
thoughts, feelings, and emotions of our loved ones and respect them by never making fun of their
suffering. However the more we take the lighter way of looking at things the easier it is to manage
them.

Don’t lose your sense of humor and don’t take everything so seriously if you are a family caregiver. It is
all a process not a race. There is no destination only a state of being. If you remember that it will keep
you light and a little less stressed. Time away serves you and your loved one. Be sure to take some time
when you make some time.

Gotta Get Away?

By the time a caregiver decides to take a break they are either in a hospital bed or they are in the floor
crying and on the verge of a breakdown, only minutes away from a hospital bed. I still haven’t figured
out why we work ourselves to exhaustion the way we do. There are warning signs everywhere that we
should be slowing down or stopping yet we continue on.

Not having help is one of the main causes of “caregiver burnout” the other cause is deliberate refusal to
take a break, we either feel no one else can do the job as well as we can or we don’t trust that anyone
can do the job as well as we can . Loved ones everywhere all over the world wind up in convalescent
homes or tossed out on the street because their caregiver wound up hospitalized and there was no one
to care for them or the caregiver died and there was no one left to care for the loved one.

Do you know how many caregivers die from stress due to being over worked while caregiving?
According to AgingCare.com 30% of caregivers die taking care of their loved ones! That’s a very high
number of caregivers losing their lives because they didn’t heed the warning signs , and they kept going
when they should have stopped to rest and to get help.

Before I was sent to the emergency room there were signs I was in distress. I didn’t know then but the
constantly getting sick, the insomnia, the loss of appetite and the irritability were all signs I was in
trouble. I ignored my body, but most importantly I ignored my doctor’s orders to rest and take time for
myself. I couldn’t recognize I was in trouble because I was in denial and allowing my guilt to over take
me. I could have lost my life because I valued more what I thought people would say about me asking
for help. I had too much pride to tell my husband I was in trouble and in need of his help. I had way too
much of responsibility for my sons life that he should have had, and was capable of handling as he
showed later on once I relinquished my need to do it all.

If you are a caregiver caring for a loved one with a mental illness, you know your in need of a break long
before the signs start to show. You know you’re not sleeping well. You know you’re tired and grumpy.
You have all the signs long before you know you are in need of a break, so what is keeping you from
taking the break?

Money? When is the last time you reviewed your finances to see what you are spending money on. Is
there something you can do without so that you can hire a professional caregiver to come in to relieve
you? You say your loved one isn’t comfortable with someone coming in. Well if you die they will be
uncomfortable with who has to take care of them then right? I would much rather be alive and having
my loved one a little upset than the alternative.

Is it you don’t know anyone? It’s time to get involved in community events, join a caregiver group or
start one. Go to your religious organization and ask for help from your members, you will be surprised
how many people may have the experience to help you, there are so many people with Masters in Social
Work degrees, and Psychology professionals and a host of other professions and experiences you may
find within your current circle of association. You will never know until you ask.

Planning the Escape

Once a caregiver decided to do something there is very little you can do to deter them. Think a doctor
saying you have to call your insurance company to see if this service is covered and being told it isn’t. A
caregiver will call everyone, research everything, and show up to places where they need to get the help
and refuse to leave until they are able to get what they came for.

How do we channel that energy and turn it in the direction of the caregiver and their self-care? That is a
question that is plaguing so many health professionals right now as the increase in caregiver illnesses
and stress has caused many to turn their eyes and attention to the family caregiver. As important as the
caregiver is to the loved one battling a long term illness they are equally important to our healthcare
industry. Family caregivers take a great deal of burden off our health care industry by caring for our
loved ones from the comfort of their homes. The National Center for Biotechnology Information calls
the family caregiver, “….critical partners in the plan of care for patients…”

I have had numerous conversations about the impact the family caregiver has on the recovery of the
loved one battling a mental illness and how a loving and supportive environment does wonders for
someone fighting to recover. Many mental health professionals and facilities are now offering programs
to teach the family to support the loved one diagnosed with a mental illness or disorder. Families are
being recognized as an integral part of the patient’s success during accepting of diagnosis and the
journey to mental health management.

With this knowledge you understand how important a caregiver is to their loved one and how their self-
care is an investment towards the recovery and the self-sufficiency ultimately for the loved one capable
of caring for and living on their own with minimal support. The goal for the caregiver is to maintain a life
outside of caregiving where there is time to do the things you once loved and enjoyed.

How do you manage your loved ones care and your own? By investing in tools to make your lives easier
and more manageable. You learn how to plan your day. You learn how to customize the mental health
care journey to fit your, your loved ones, and your family’s need. Whether that is to sit down with a
professional time management coach or to sit down and organize your day including your care and care
demands for your loved one and to devise a plan to benefit ALL involved. You want to distribute the
tasks and chores associated with the care of your loved one. You want to become educated on the
illness and the ways you, your loved one and your family could best benefit from the knowledge you will
gain from researching the illness and how to manage it.

Once you know what you are battling its easier to devise a battle plan to give you and your famly a
fighting chance against mental illness.

It all comes down to how will you began organizing your day so that it fulfills the needs of you and your
family as you support your loved one. The method and plan of action varies for each family beause
mental illness is such a unique and complex disease and disorder, you must approach it from a direction
that best suits your family, culture, finances, abilities, and limitations. There is a successful way for you,
but it requires some elbow grease, sweat, tears, and determination.

I Left My Baggage

Once you decide to get the help you deserve you are going to come face to face with many challenges.
You will want to quit when it gets hard. You will feel uncomfortable. You will feel overwhelmed. You will
feel insecure and unprepared. All of those are natural reactions to fighting to build the life you will
appreciate and are able to grow with while finding satisfaction, peace and happiness that is custom fit to
your situation. Not what you think it should be but what it really is.

Part of the success of your journey is letting go of things that no longer serve you. Fear is one of them.
Sometimes fear is the hardest and the only thing standing between us and the life we want. I tell
caregivers often, “…once you give up the fear of failing, of what people will say about your new life,
about what people think about what you are doing new in your life. You will find yourself living a life
that is peaceful and full. Not perfect but your life your way on your terms.

One of the ways to get past the fear and to move your family towards a more loving and accepting life is
to get into therapy or counseling. Many times we are not equipped for the the battle of the “habits” and
require someone in a professional field, who has the ability to give us new habits and new coping skills
as well as teaching us to process the negative emotions that can sometimes show up in families
supporting a loved one with a mental illness.

The feelings of guilt, shame, resentment, or indifference can all cause a rift within our family and can
lead to more stress and more discord in our homes. We don’t have to live that way. Our lives won’t be
perfect ever and that ‘s even outside of mental illness without the weight of mental illness on a family,
families struggle with living and fitting into the “idea” of the perfect family.

Everyone is smiling there are no problems or arguments and all is well. I believe some families have less
trouble than others and they may even have better coping skills they have used to be successful in
keeping down the amount of discord, but ultimately it all boils down to acceptance. Once we can accept
what our limitations and our assets are we can build the relationships that will last and endure
adversities.

Every couple that decides to settle down and have a family brings with them the life skills they learned
from their parents. Sometimes they are not the most functional life skills and that is where the family
has to recognize there is a challenge and be willing to fix it. In a family without mental illness that is
difficult, add mental illness and things can get interesting. One family member doesn’t want to talk
about what is going on in front of strangers. Another family member refuses to see another side and are
conviced there is no hope for their family.

The only way to truly have a family unit that respects each persons individual contributions to the whole
is to embrace the individual, flaws and all. Doing so liberates the family unit. People don’t feel pressured
to be what they are not, there is a level of freedom that is indescribable from acceptance.

Don’t feel bad because your family hasn’t found the happy medium yet, it doesn’t mean it’s not there, it
means you need help developing it and bringing it to the surface. A thereapist or counselor is a great

way to bring a neutral party into the picture who is able to objectively assess the family and offer
professional advice and treatment to get your family on their way to living better and being the support
system your loved one requires to have a successful recovery and lifetime management of their illness
or disorder.

How do you get everyone on board for this part of the journey? You reassure them what you are asking
is for the betterment of your family. Not everyone will agree and that’s fine. It’s fine if it’s only you and
your loved one who goes to therapy because the difference it will make in how you interact with one
another may encourage the others to want that kind of peace as well.

As I mentioned different environmental factors and cultural factors as well as financial limitations or
health insurance coverage can have a negative impact on the success of a family in mental illness
manangement. Researching the different programs you may qualify for and trimming the fat on some of
the purchases for the family may need to happen. Fundrasing is another way to fund the necessary
threrapy for your family. You must want it bad enough that you are willing to do what it takes to get
there.

There are countless self help books available for those who are disciplined enough to carry out the
exercises to better their lives and learn new ways of coping with their emotions, there is no execuse to
suffer unnecessarily.

The more you are willing to invest in your family, your loved one, and your family’s journey the better
you will be for it and the better quality of life you all get to experience. Your self care is also part of
seeing a therapist. It’s great to have someone subjective to speak to about what you may be feeling or
need help processing. It’s all in what is your priority?

Can you trim some from entertainment? Can you cut back on eating out? Whatever your decision
ultimately you must want to be better and to see your loved ones life better by making the sacrifices
and doing the hard work now and when you get down the line you are able to appreciate your journey
but most importantly you have peace and your loved one is able to thrive and grown accustomed to
their new way of living as well as our families. It’s all about hard work and plenty of it.

Arrival

When my son moved out on his own the last time I was apprehensive, but at the same time I
understood what he meant when he told me he needed to get out there and try his wings again, that he
was ready to be on his own again. His confidence level had increased and he was sure he was ready. Has
it been perfect? No but it has been better than it was when we started. He is living on his own and
thriving. There is not a time when I get a phone call that I don’t wonder if he’s okay or if we need to be
on standby for an update.

The gift given to our family by us doing our research and embracing my son and by explaining to him we
all loved him no matter what and that we all were there to support him as long as there is breath in our
bodies, it’s priceless. You cannot give greater gifts than acceptance and love.

Once a family comes to terms with what their lives are and that having a mental illness or disorder is not
the end of the road for their family but the beginning of a new road the opportunities are endless. I can
tell you our family knows more compassion today for one another than ever before. There is an
understanding for others who also battle mental illness. We know how much stronger and closer we are
because of it.

I share often how God uses certain life experiences to teach us and to refine us. I’m not saying God gave
me and my son mental illnesses, what I’m saying is that our faith and Gods love got us through the hard
times, the times when we didn’t think our family could take another hit or downfall.

We were blessed by the adversity that is mental illness. You will find once you have decided to go all in
and release the fear and the assumptions about what mental illness is and may be and get educated on
what it is. Knowledge is power and it will give you the courage to fight once you know what you are
fighting. You cannot fight an opponent if you don’t know who you are fighting. You cannot devise a plan
of war against something you know nothing about. Research and then research again. Build binders or
notebooks of information. Pray and keep going and keep believing. Don’t try to do it all, let people help
you, and show them how to help you. People really are good and want to be of service. There are some
really good people out in the world looking for ways to make an impact those are the ones you want to
stay around.

Leave the naysayers in their spots and get around some positive people willing to help you and your
loved one to get through what is one of the most difficult times in anyone’s life, learning to live with a
brain that is different than other peoples brain, and behaviors that are unique to your disorder or illness.
You don’t need added stress or pressure from those who don’t understand.

Try educating people who don’t know or understand mental illness but don’t tolerate ignorance or
rudeness. Go around them you have somewhere to go.

I hope something in this e-book will be of assistance to you, your loved one, and your family. I pray you
and your family flourish and find your paths. Remember it’s your journey. You can customize it to fit

your family. What is important is that you do whatever it is that will make you successful. May God
bless you real good.

La Shawn is a Mental Health Survivor & Mental Health Family Caregiver. Although her passion has
always been to help those in need, Homagi began 12 years ago as a nonprofit for homeless women and
children, she chose to use her experience as a Mental Health Family Caregiver to guide other family
caregivers on their journey as they assist their loved ones on theirs. She is known for her vibrant smile,
easy going personality, positive attitude, and servant spirit. Always willing to stop and listen or share an
experience with others, you feel heard and appreciated. Don't let those characteristics fool you into
believing she's not an advocate who will stand up, march, and make the voice of the sometimes
voiceless heard. A California native, now a Houstonian she loves the beach, hiking, crocheting and
woodwork. She is married to her best friend and co-pilots their blended family of 5 children and 3
granddaughters.

Homagi is an organization helping mental health family caregivers, their loved ones and families create
the custom fit journey and life they can live with.