Supporting others can be physically and emotionally difficult. When you spend a lot of time looking after others, it can feel like there’s no time or energy left for you. To avoid burnout and feelings of being overwhelmed, it’s imperative that we spend some time focusing on our own wellbeing.
You may have your own definition of what a carer is, but I’ll offer up an example definition…
A carer is anyone who cares, unpaid, for a friend or family member who due to illness, disability, mental ill health or an addiction – cannot cope without their support. Anyone could be a carer. Sometimes we’re carers without even really acknowledging or realising we are. There’s no legal definition of how much time you have to care for, to be a classed as a carer, it could mean anything from a few hours a day, to 24 hours a day, 7 days a week and you may or may not live with the person you’re caring for.
It may come as no surprise that although for many carers, caring can be positive and rewarding – caring can have an impact on many aspects of our lives and there are lots of reasons why caring can also leave us needing support.
For example, it’s suggested that carers are nearly one and half times more likely to say they’re not in good health, in comparison to the general population.[1]
As caring can impact on our ability to get out-and-about, connecting with others, impact on our employment, work and learning, finances and our health and wellbeing – it is important to consider the things that you could do to look after yourself and your wellbeing.
Let’s start with what we can do to look after ourselves as carers, here’s the lifestyle fundamentals – movement, nutrition, sleep and rest.
Movement: It can be so hard to overcome the barriers to becoming more active when you’re a carer. If you’re caring around the clock, it can feel almost impossible to find the time. Fortunately, now, there are more options to take advantage of than ever, so hopefully you will be able to find an activity to suit your lifestyle. Even the smallest changes can add up to significant gains.
You could try making an arrangement with a family member, friend or trusted neighbour to see if they could look after the person you care for, for an hour or two. See what services are provided by your local carers’ organisation or council. There are also activities you could try that might be enjoyable to do together.
If it’s practically impossible to take any time out, try to make small changes to increase your activity levels during your daily routine such as using the stairs smartly by repeating two up then two down steps.
Nutrition: As a carer, eating a balanced diet is essential to provide your body with all the nutrients it needs. A balanced diet will keep your body strong and give you enough energy to provide the best care for the person you are caring for and yourself. By understanding what a balanced diet looks like and how to fit it into your lifestyle you can look after your own health and wellbeing. A top tip is look to eat as many varied and colourful whole foods as possible – eat the rainbow!
Sleep: Having problems sleeping is common and can be a recurring issue when you care for someone. Occasionally having a disturbed night will affect you the following day, but if you are having trouble sleeping for longer than a night or two, then everything will seem harder.
You may find that you are constantly tired, drop off during the day, have trouble concentrating and making decisions, and start feeling lower in mood. Long-term lack of sleep may also increase your risk of experiencing mental and physical ill health.
Think – comfort, calm, low light levels, a temperature that’s not too hot or cold, a consistent bedtime routine if possible, keeping the bedroom for sleep only – so try and limit work, watching TV and using mobile devices before bed
Keep a notepad by your bed so that if you are worried about something, you can write it down to get it off your chest and be ready to deal with it the next day.
Rest and taking a break: Everyone’s needs are different and it may be helpful to take a step back to assess what would work for you. Some people would benefit from an hour each week, a day here and there or a week or two for a holiday.
Understandably this will largely depend on the needs of who you are caring for. Some carers choose to go on holiday together with the person they care for – sometimes with a paid carer – or some stay at home while the person they care for goes away or stays with friends.
Connect with nature: Try to get outside more – simply try to enjoy some fresh air as sunlight is an important source of vitamin D. A lack of vitamin D will cause tiredness. Many people find it helps to take vitamin D supplements over the winter when there is less light.
Spending time in green space or bringing nature into your everyday life can benefit both your mental and physical wellbeing.
Bring nature indoors. You could try listening to birdsong, looking at pictures of animals or watching nature from your window.
You could buy flowers, potted plants or seeds to grow on your window sill. Or you could collect natural materials from outdoors, such as leaves, flowers or feathers, and use them to decorate your living space.
Some people find that being with animals is calming and enjoyable. You could try pet-sitting or dog walking, feed birds from your window, or visit a local community farm.
Connect with others: Good relationships are important for your mental wellbeing. They can: help you to build a sense of belonging and self-worth, give you an opportunity to share positive experiences and provide emotional support and allow you to support others. How could you increase connection with others in your life?
Pay attention to the present: Paying attention to the present moment or your senses can be helpful, by paying more attention to your senses while doing things you do each day, for example, while washing up, brushing your teeth or eating. It can be easy to rush through life without stopping to notice much. Paying more attention to the present moment – to your own thoughts and feelings, and to the world around you – can improve your mental wellbeing.
Sharing how you feel: Although everyone’s story of caring for someone is unique, there are common threads weaving throughout many carers’ experiences. If you’re going through a tough time, turn to kind and supportive people who will be there to help you through it. If none of your friends or family members are particularly good listeners or empathetic, turn to an organisation. It can help to share your experiences with others on a forum or through joining a local carers’ support group.
Find positives in your relationship: As fulfilling as caring can be, it can also be demanding and can sometimes place a strain on your relationships. Changes can occur gradually or quite suddenly and your relationships, especially with loved ones, can feel very different from how they were before. Sometimes you may feel close and connected. But at other times you may feel angry and irritated. It can help to talk openly and honestly to find ways of coping together.
You could try to:
- consider yourself as their friend, partner or family member first and foremost
- talk together about how to strengthen positive parts of your relationship
- find common interests or hobbies to do together as well as day-to-day responsibilities.
- Identify what is going well, the positives aspects of how things are and look to build on them, together if possible.
Support their independence: It’s important to help them have some control over their care. You may find this means taking a step back or supporting decisions that are not what you would do. But it may also mean that you can find a balance in your relationship, and perhaps a little more time for yourself.
Work with them to find out:
- how they can help themselves
- what support they need from you
- whether there are times that they can cope on their own.
Acts of kindness: Doing good does us good. Doing something nice for someone doesn’t cost a lot of time or money. It’s the small things in life that can make a big difference.
Some examples of acts of kindness:
- Call a friend that you haven’t spoken to for a while
- Send someone a handwritten note
- Tell your family members how much you love and appreciate them
- Make someone laugh
- Tell someone you know that you are proud of them
- Send a motivational text to a friend who is struggling
- Send someone you know a joke to cheer them up
Talk kindly to yourself: Self-kindness is important for our wellbeing. We spend more time with ourselves than anyone else and how we relate to ourselves has a huge impact on how we feel. Often, we’re our own worst critic. When we feel anxious or frustrated, we talk to ourselves more harshly than we’d find acceptable from anyone else.
Compassionate self-talk involves talking to ourselves the way we would talk to someone whom we love and want to support and encourage.
Think about the words you might say to someone else who was experiencing distress and how you might speak to them. Imagine saying the same phrases to yourself in the same way.
Here are some examples of compassionate phrases you may wish to have to hand when needed…
- ‘This is a difficult moment and it will pass’
- ‘I’m deserving of help and direction’
- ‘It’s okay to make mistakes and learn from those mistakes’
- ‘I am going to be kind to myself in this moment’
Learn to understand and manage your feelings: Emotions are how we feel about something and how our body reacts. For example, if we experience fear, we might feel our heart beating faster or notice our hands shaking. Feelings are how we experience our emotions and give meaning to them. They are different for everyone. For example, you might associate your hands shaking with feeling anxious. Recognising your feelings is the first step towards understanding them and learning how to cope with them. It might feel difficult at first, but with time and practice, it will get easier.
- Set aside time to check in with how you’re feeling. You could use a notebook, journal or your phone to write down your feelings.
- Practise paying attention to your feelings in the moment. For example, how do you feel when doing something you enjoy? Or how do you feel when doing something you find difficult or scary?
- Express your feelings creatively. You could write, draw, paint or try arts and crafts.
We’ll move on now to consider the first of our positive coping strategies…
Caring can involve a whole range of complex emotions and feelings. These can also fluctuate and change over time. Some people feel resentful about how their life has changed and then guilty for feeling that way. Although they are common, these feelings can be hard to deal with. As a first step, it is important to acknowledge your feelings and try not to bottle them up.
Some people describe caring as an ‘emotional rollercoaster’. Often because of the conditions of those being cared for, each day can be very unpredictable. This can be a huge source of stress and having positive coping strategies are important for your own health and wellbeing.
One example of a positive coping strategy is the STOPP approach outlined here.
Stop! Say it to yourself, in your head, as soon as you notice your mind and/or your body is reacting to a trigger.
Stop! helps to put in the space between the stimulus (the trigger, whatever we are reacting to) and our response.
The earlier you use STOPP (stop, take a breath, observe, perspective and practice what works), the easier and more effective it will be.
Take a Breath. Breathing a little deeper and slower will calm you down. Focusing on our breathing means we are not so focused on the thoughts and feelings of the distress, so that our minds can start to clear and we can think more logically and rationally.
Observe. We can notice the thoughts going through our mind, we can notice what we feel in our body, and we can notice the urge to react in an impulsive way. We can notice the vicious cycle of anxiety, sadness or anger etc. Noticing helps us to defuse from those thoughts and feelings and therefore reduce their power and control.
Pull back / Put in some Perspective. Don’t believe everything you think! Thoughts are thoughts – NOT statements of fact. When we step back emotionally from a situation, and start to see the bigger picture, it reduces those distressing beliefs. We can do this by asking ourselves questions.
What is another way of looking at this situation?
What advice would I give a friend?
What is a more reasonable explanation?
How important will it be in 6 months time?
And lastly, PRACTISE WHAT WORKS
- What is the best thing to do right now?
- What is the most helpful thing for me, for others, for the situation?
- What can I do that fits with my values?
- Where can I focus my attention right now?
- Do what will be effective and appropriate.
Another positive coping strategy is using a ‘traffic light’ approach. It helps us to increase our self-awareness; your ability to perceive and understand the things that make you who you are as an individual, including your actions, values, beliefs, emotions, and thoughts.
When we use this traffic light approach we’re aiming to understand ourselves well enough over time to recognise when we are in the green, amber and red zones. We want to be in the green space as often as possible, but sometimes we end can end up in the amber or red space – when things in or outside of our control impact on our wellbeing.
There’s different layers or steps to your green, amber and red, which you can see on the right hand side of the slide here. I’ll give you some examples to bring this to life a bit more…
Layer 1 – what happens, what do you notice – identify thoughts, emotions, physical sensations and behaviours
For example someone might notice that they might be moving into the amber zone if they started having thoughts that they didn’t have enough time to go for the walk they said they would go on with a friend, the sense of urgency, or having too much to do and not enough time was making them panic.
Layer 2 – what would you do to look after yourself? Movement, rest, connect with nature or others for example.
Linked to the example I just gave, the person may use the STOPP technique and notice what was going through their mind, take a breath, question or challenge their thinking and find a practical solution.
Layer 3 – who can I speak to – it’s likely we’ll have different people we feel comfortable reaching out to at green, amber and red. And what services could you access?
It might be the person I’ve given as an example before also chooses to speak to their friend about their experience and finds it reassuring and supportive avenue for them.
So how could you use this? Having a written prompt either on a notepad or on a device, can help increase your awareness of when you might be moving out of the green zone into amber, making the implementation of positive coping strategies quicker and more effective. Identifying the positive coping strategies you might find helpful can mean there is a helpful prompt when you need it. I’ve used my traffic light a lot, it’s flexible and adjustable – so when I learn new tools or identify new triggers – I can adjust my traffic light and it’s readily accessible.
Another example of a positive coping strategy is a carers box…
Make a self-care kit or a ‘carer’s box’ that may help you to put together some things that could help you when you’re struggling. This self-care kit could be a box or a location that is filled with things that normally comfort you and help you relax. For example, you could include your favourite book, pictures or photos, a stress ball or fidget toy and a comforting blanket or slippers. Think about putting items in the box that encourage the use of all of your senses – sight, sound, touch, smell and taste.
Or you could make a digital self-care kit on your phone. You could save photos, music, videos, messages or sayings that you find helpful. Or notes to remind yourself how to manage difficult situations.
There are a number of options available to support all carers with a variety of topic areas: financial, practical, health and wellbeing, work and career. Carers UK and Carers Trust are great websites to explore to find information, support and advice.
[1] Office for National Statistics (ONS), released 18 April 2024, ONS website, statistical bulletin, Unpaid care expectancy and health outcomes of unpaid carers, England: April 2024
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