Are you genuinely curious, or just expressing relief that you don’t have to do this kind of work? If you’re curious, we can tell you what we’ve experienced as volunteer caregivers for friends and family members. We can also describe what we’ve learned from observing and talking with other caregivers who do this kind of work for a living.
Many Alzheimer’s and dementia caregivers, for example, have told us they like working with other people and having some day-to-day variety in what they do. They’d rather work in a memory care home than on an assembly line or at a check-out counter, and they like helping residents more than serving customers. They also like somewhat structured jobs where they get to work with other people. They see memory home care as more social and less isolating, for example, than gardening, house cleaning or private home assistance. The caregivers we’ve talked to also value the visibility of their work to others. They’re delighted when residents and fellow caregivers look forward to seeing them, when they light up at the chance to talk, joke, or do something together. And it’s not just about being appreciated. They also like seeing their work improve the quality of someone else’s life.
This kind of improvement may be more visible when caring for people who live with Alzheimer’s or dementia. They’re not not only struggling with catastrophic personal loss, but doing so in the face of death itself. Under such grim circumstances it’s a wonder so many memory care residents find a way to live with grace, dignity and verve. But caregivers see evidence of that and get to help it happen pretty much every day. That’s probably why many caregivers we’ve talked with refer to residents as courageous and heroic, almost as if they were characters in literature or movies. They’ll tell us how remarkable, spirited and imaginative their residents can be—how they talk like poets and say things that are wise, funny and affecting all at once. Rather than pity the people they’re caring for, they take inspiration from them. As volunteer caregivers, we came to see people living with Alzheimer’s and dementia in similar terms. We found ways to engage with them as friends, companions, partners and soul mates. A single visit might bring moments of fun, sadness, stimulation or frustration that, taken together, were extraordinarily rewarding.
Many caregivers also see people with Alzheimer’s or other dementias as living through the last, and most challenging, chapter of life’s foretold tale. They feel privileged to accompany residents through the end-of-life transition and to share the intimacy, love and reverence it can engender. When that privilege became ours as well, the wisdom of other caregivers was a constant comfort. Watching caregivers help residents pass with dignity from this world to the next, we also came to admire their courage and compassion. In comforting residents and family members, they affirm memory care homes as somewhat sacred places. They cherish the opportunities such places provide for them to help people live more gracefully with Alzheimer’s or dementia and to learn a little more each day about what it means to be alive—not just for memory care residents, but for the rest of us as well.
If you can imagine at least some of what we’ve seen and heard or learned from caregivers, you’ll have a partial answer to your question. And if you can’t, maybe that’s a good place to start.