There is strength to love

The school of patronage care as a cure for despair, burnout and fatigue

We help the school of patronage care "Attention and care" to help

Pandemia, quarantine, closing borders, emergency, commandant hour-no one expected such a spring-2020. Every day, all new countries and cities are closed. Each of us can be locked in four walls for at least a couple of weeks at any time.

Where the ban on the exit from the house is still not total, in social networks they exchange lists of cases that will help to survive quarantine. Things for a couple of weeks are usually pleasant and cozy: see all the series, read all the books, play with children, prepare delicious, have dinner with relatives on Skype, drink with colleagues in Zoom.

Two weeks later, books, series and hearts in chats are no longer pleasing. I hope every second acquaintance writes, soon we will all leave our quarantines and go live on.

Of course we will go out.

Everything except those who are locked in four walls for life.

"Mom does not recognize the words" no "

“We had one model of family relationships before my mother’s strokes, and then I had to create everything again,” says Julia. - And it was not easy.

Julia herself is well familiar with the ergotherapy approach and the restoration of everyday skills in patients with motor disorders - this is part of her work.

Turn a tiny odnushka where a semi -paralyzed woman lives and her son who fell into despair, into a convenient space, where everyone lives an independent life? This is possible and these are the professional skills of Julia.

On the left: Julia's mother with children (photo from the family archive). Right: Dolls made by Julia, reminiscent of her parents and her photo: Anna Ivansova for TD

“A few simple door handles, a drill, lamps on the batteries, an old Soviet meat grinder and engineering thinking - that’s the whole secret,” says Julia. - Only in the case of their own parents you have to come up with not only what to do, but also how to convince them. My mother, despite the disease, remains a man with such a character ...

Julia falls silent, choosing words to better describe her mother's character.

Decisive? Die-hard? Indomitable?

All the wrong definitions are too weak.

You can start with the fact that Yulina’s mother has two names: in the world she lived for many years like Lidia Fedorovna, and after tonsure became the mother of Alexandra.

Parents, Julia says, have existed all their lives as one close -knit organism and did all together. And when Mom had occurred to move many kilometers from Moscow to restore the destroyed temple, my father, of course, went after her.

While the wife (with seven inhabitants from a tiny monastery) was engaged in the repair of the cathedral, the husband bought a nearby land and built a house. This is nothing, he thought that there was a lot of hard work now. Here the repair will end, and we will live in a large warm house on the river bank.

“But my mother does not admit, she always goes to the end in any business,” Julia says, telling how her mother decided to take tonsure and live with the rest of the nuns.

- And after that, dad returned to Moscow? I ask knowingly.

- Of course not! How could he leave if his beloved wife lived without any amenities? - says Julia. - Dad stayed, repaired the building of the former mail, made a cell building for the nuns from it and still arranged a garden nearby.

Julia Sitnikova Photo: Anna Ivantsova for TD

Before this place, the story of the parents sounded so strange that if Julia said, “and then dad raised the Garden, and my mother built another temple and received another order for this,” I would not be surprised.

“And then my mother had the first stroke,” says Julia. And he said everyday life that after rehabilitation, the mother returned to the monastery again, because the restoration of the cathedral was not completed. And dad, of course, went after it again - to look, help, care. And then there was a second stroke.

- Finally, even my mother became clear that it was necessary to move back to Moscow and engage in rehabilitation. And I thought that now I would apply all my knowledge, I will organize a convenient life and the right regime for my parents.

Julia sighs. And we have been talking for a long time about the almost childish sense of powerlessness, when each conversation with parents ends with devastation and desire to scream: “Why aren't you listening to me?!” Those who at least once tried to convince their parents in something will easily remember this feeling. Even if you are a smart, adult, demanded specialist who offers the best of the possible, for some reason the last word is still behind the mother.

"Four mouths - four ears"

If you open the site of the Particular and Care School School, which describes the basic cartridge care program in detail, you see a strange one. For some reason, studying on the course does not begin with the “Movement”, “Hygiene” and “First Aid” modules, but with the “Carecare process” and “Communication”.

Left: Parents of Julia (photo from the family archive). Right: dolls made by Julia reminiscent of her parents

But is it not logical to study the most important thing at first: how to feed, wash, turn it over, how to avoid leaning, how to change diapers, how to engage in rehabilitation where it is possible? Even with a nurse, these basic things can cause many questions.

So why are the first few classes devoted to some evaluative scales, conducting documentation and strange points like working with a biography and the “four mouths-four ear” model?

- Because this is the basis: how to build daily communication without a hassle and unnecessary emotions. When you take care of your loved ones, you are all the time inside some continuous chaos and pain and there is no strength to look at the situation from the outside, there is no strength to make plans and keep a diary of caring for the patient. I used to have the feeling that it was impossible to reach my parents. You tell them what to do - they do not. You show that they do not remember. You get tired, you are offended, repeat the same thing, but neither mom nor dad seems to be heard.

For some time, Julia carefully examines tea in an elegant cup with a gold rim.

From a similar cup I drink strong black tea when I come to my mother. Typically, tea will not finish yet, and my mother has already managed to reject my help, tips and constructive proposals several times. Sometimes my mother answers absolutely everything: “I am not old yet and can do perfectly” and “Well, to whom you tell, I myself know everything!” (The topic is any, intonation is decisive). Because my mother also has a character. And how to cope with him is not very clear.

- That's why it is very soothing when they give a clear algorithm in the courses, according to which you can ask questions and solve problems, even when everyone is tired and burned out. And the conversations gradually become calmer, and even it turns out without hesitation to discuss some intimate points in care.

Julia says that thanks to his studies, he managed to build a new one around his mother - as convenient as possible to her and her dad caring - life.

Julia Sitnikova Photo: Anna Ivantsova for TD

- Communication has become easier, we have new family rituals, and our parents have a mode, schedule and an opportunity to get out of four walls. Maybe that's why dad and mom now have the strength to live, feel, and I have the strength to love them.

Those who lived along with seriously ill patients looked after lying relatives who have the obligations to help, find seats and be in touch around the clock, know the word “burnout” well and humble it with it. They come to terms with the fact that “hard and sadly” can continue for many years that relations in the family will now always be built around the care of those who are sick, and the life of the rest will adapt to this schedule. That you just have to not complain and endure, since it happened.

No, do not endure. Yes, you can complain. No, your life does not come down only to care and care. Yes, asking for help is normal. And live your own life. And make sure that the forces appear not only to endure.

The first classes at the patronage school are an oxygen mask, which is put on tired, exhausted by unsolved problems and guilt of people, which sometimes leave the house only to these weekly classes. Therefore, the mask here is put on first on the one who saves everyone else.

- What is the most pleasant now in communicating with mom? - Julia is thinking, but not for long. - Our weekly bath, probably. Previously, it was just my duty, but now our time to calmly stay together. “Mom, what gel do you want today? No, choose yourself, please. Vanilla? Okay, and what washout? Softer or harder? "

Do not rush anywhere, talk and ask questions, do not reduce all communication and manipulations, talk about your feelings too. It is not so easy to learn this, even when everyone is healthy and everything is fine. But to study this when in the house seriously ill, more importantly, a hundred times more important.

Last August in the country was noisy. Children and grandchildren gathered - there are pies, drink tea in the summer garden and celebrate fifty years of their parents' luna. Half a century, which have combined so many incredible events, adventures and indestructible love. And after the anniversary, two kittens came running to the country (“also looking for attention and care,” Julia writes) and did not go anywhere else.

Left: Parents of Julia (photo from the family archive). Right: Dolls that Julia made her parents photo: Anna Ivantsova for TD

After our conversation, I think not one day that many people would not interfere with a full course of patronage care. To me, my friends, my colleagues and everyone who has parents. So far relatively healthy and very independent dads and mothers, who all always know better than us. Who can take care, but do not know how to take care. Who are able to give, but do not know how to ask for help. It’s not too late.

Well, if these parents have us, and we have the right knowledge. The knowledge that the patronage school provides completely free of charge: full -time courses, distance learning, detailed videos, seminars and trainings, training of seats and volunteers.

The school has an answer to any question to care for seriously ill and palliative patients, but state grants only partially cover its expenses and it really needs our support with you.

Sign up for any amount of monthly donation, please.

Then, no matter what happens to our loved ones and our parents, we will not only endure the forces, but also love.

We talk about various funds that work and help in Moscow, but Moscow experience can be useful and used in other regions of the country.