Truth and Grace: the Cornerstones of Surviving as a Caregiver

Cornerstones of Caregiving: Truth and Grace

They say God provides grace for every moment of a
caregiver’s journey.

True.

But that doesn’t mean it’s easy.
Moments of doubt and frustration;
Tired of wearing a happy-face-state-of-grace and tired of
acting like the strong one who could
shoulder the chemo and the radiation and the
tender hearts and cuts and bruises and hurt feelings of
children facing too much too young.

And God did provide
Grace for the journey. I knew an
invisible, yet warm and loving hand rested on my
shoulder when I gazed into the future and didn’t know
if Pedro had a next hour, a next minute or a next breath.

Grace looks like casseroles on the front porch, and
money left in books, and early-morning
rides to the airport, and
selfless giving in times of utter darkness.

Nonetheless,
Caregiving creates a loneliness inside, an
utter exhaustion that clouds the picture of grace once the
race for life is won.

True.
God provides grace for the
recovering caregiver’s journey, too. Through
found friends in similar circumstance, a
sympathetic listener who ‘gets’ the term ‘recovering cancer caregiver.’
God provides community to part the clouds so I once again see His
Grace.

How have you discovered God’s grace in your caregiving journey? We’d love to have you share your stories in the comments (or link up if you have a blog!).

Find stories of encouragment (or leave a story of encouragement) at the Caregiver Connections link up today! #caregiver #caregivers Click To Tweet

Caregiver Spotlight

Today’s spotlight shines on Barbara Harper, who blogs over at Stray Thoughts. She compiled a beautiful list of encouraging Bible verses for caregivers. Pop on over to Barabara’s today for some awesome encouragement!

Link-Up!

[callout]Guidelines

In order to make this link up user friendly AND pertinent to caregivers and their needs, please make sure that what you link up follows the guidelines for the week. This week is for ENCOURAGEMENT FOR CAREGIVERS.  Share a link that will encourage a caregiver. If you aren’t sure if your link is appropriate, feel free to email me at anita at blessedbutstressed dot com and ask!

We will delete links that aren’t on topic in order to keep the link up a true community resource. We WILL contact you first and let you know that we will remove your link.

For non-caregiving related links, we invite you to participate in the Inspire Me Monday link up over at www.anitaojeda.com.

By linking up, you agree to receive weekly reminders about the link up.

Do look for the caregiver boards on Pinterest.

Do link up more than one post!

Join our Facebook community, too! It’s easy, just click that button over on the right! —->

The whole point of the link up is to make connections and form community with other caregivers, so don’t forget to visit the person who linked up before you as well as the person who linked up after you.

If you read something that moves you, share! Tweet, pin, share on Facebook, whatever it takes to draw others into to our caregiver stories. All too often, caregivers suffer in silence because they don’t think anyone cares to hear their voice. We care! If you’d like to join the Caregiver Connections Pinterest Board (so you can pin your caregiver-related posts), just drop me an email at anita at blessedbutstressed dot com.[/callout]