Am I a bad caretaker if I start burnout?

I don't know what agency you are with but there are laws to prevent you working so many hours and days. If you are not with an agency, tell the family you must have another caregiver relieve you as your health will suffer, and I mean NOW.

I have a bedside potty for my Aunt, who is 95, so that she doesn't have to walk anywhere during the night. Also, there is a service that provides a monitor for them to wear around their necks. It's more than "I've fallen and can't get up". This monitor detects movement so that the person that falls doesn't have to notify the monitoring company. It senses the fall and contacts family, emergency, etc to let them know about the fall. I know ADT has it. Good luck.

Hi beenthere60. What is ADT? My patient insist on her ability to stay independent. Any equipment to manage elderly daily living, kind of chalengging. She was independent this past 30 years. I have to lie lot about who i am, what i am doing, why i always beside her, why i sleep in her room. Yeaaa,,,I am invisible caregiver.

ADT is the name of the home security company that offers the service I described above. Listen, my Aunt has been living with me about 3 months. Doesn't sound as if she is quite as challenging as the lady you take care of. But even though she is my family, I'm already feeling the burnout. Don't do this to yourself. Find some options. I take my Aunt to an Adult Day Care 2 days a week which gives me as wonderful break. And, I can leave her alone for short periods of time. I would be ready for a straight jacket if it weren't for these things.

You cannot control burnout, just like you can't control depression. Also please don't compare yourself to others, every caregiving situation is different because each family and patient is different. Please be kind to yourself. :)

I seem to swing between normality and insanity - my doctor wouldlove to call it depression but it truly isn't - been there had that and it is NOT depression, it really does just depend on the frustrations of the day with mum or with external professionals who seem to be able to cause the biggest frustrations

My advice is to find another job. There is no shortage of people needing caregivers and these people are asking you to do something they themselves are not willing to do for their own family member. They sound like people with an 'entitlement issue.' They aren't being considerate of your needs or right to your own time and life at all. Even God wouldn't ask this of you and in the end there won't be any gratitude on their part worth sacrificing yourself. I know-I took care of a couple for two years 24/7. Only within the last six months of that time period did I convince everyone involved that I HAD to have some respite. I got out maybe one evening a week and partial weekends off. The daughter ended up putting her parents in a nursing home in the end and they both died within a couple of months. I doubt that I ended up making even $one dollar! an hour with all the time I put in. They cared so little about their parents that I had to even do the hiring, training, and firing of the 'help.' I loved the couple like my own parents and experience much love and blessings from caring for them. But in the end I was depresses, exhausted physically, emotionally and spiritually. I sacrificed time with my own children which affected our relationship. Time which I can never make up. I needed the 'work' and it was more of a 'mission and labor of love' in my heart. But it cost me dearly and I would never choose to do it again. I would insist on a regular work week or move on. (I also have a lasting and painful disability now from assisting one of the couple in walking-short periods add up over time to stress put on whatever muscles/mind or systems they strain-even with proper ergonomics) The emotional strain that caring for someone (and the grief of losing them later) over time, in such an intimate way, is hard to 'vacation' from under normal circumstances. You are under 'double jeapordy' in this situation and burnout is normal! Pay attention to it! Nativeco