A Cast Of Caregivers

What caregiving role will you play? How will you avoid the caregiving cost drain? Are you prepared for the end? How will you overcome stress, burn-out, depression, guilt? How will you find happiness and support? How do you start the caregiving conversation with a loved one? Are you caring for yourself while caregiving? More than 65 million Americans are caring for a loved one yet most don’t know what they are facing or where to get help. Caregiving expert Sherri Snelling shines a spotlight on the world of caregiving and interviews celebrities who have taken the caregiving journey and shared their lessons learned. This how-to guide also covers caregiving topics A to Z, self-care advice and more. Inside you will find numerous expert interviews and tips on how to have the C-A-R-E Conversation℠ and how to find your Me Time Monday℠. Written to inspire and empower you, this is your screenplay for health and happiness while caregiving. As Dorothy said in The Wizard of Oz, “Toto, I have a feeling we’re not in Kansas anymore.” Welcome to the Cast of Caregivers.

The story of one woman’s struggle to care for her seriously ill husband—and a revealing look at the role unpaid family caregivers play in a society that fails to provide them with structural support. Already Toast shows how all-consuming caregiving can be, how difficult it is to find support, and how the social and literary narratives that have long locked women into providing emotional labor also keep them in unpaid caregiving roles. When Kate Washington and her husband, Brad, learned that he had cancer, they were a young couple: professionals with ascending careers, parents to two small children. Brad’s diagnosis stripped those identities away: he became a patient and she his caregiver. Brad’s cancer quickly turned aggressive, necessitating a stem-cell transplant that triggered a massive infection, robbing him of his eyesight and nearly of his life. Kate acted as his full-time aide to keep him alive, coordinating his treatments, making doctors’ appointments, calling insurance companies, filling dozens of prescriptions, cleaning commodes, administering IV drugs. She became so burned out that, when she took an online quiz on caregiver self-care, her result cheerily declared: “You’re already toast!” Through it all, she felt profoundly alone, but, as she later learned, she was in fact one of millions: an invisible army of family caregivers working every day in America, their unpaid labor keeping our troubled healthcare system afloat. Because our culture both romanticizes and erases the realities of care work, few caregivers have shared their stories publicly. As the baby-boom generation ages, the number of family caregivers will continue to grow. Readable, relatable, timely, and often raw, Already Toast—with its clear call for paying and supporting family caregivers—is a crucial intervention in that conversation, bringing together personal experience with deep research to give voice to those tasked with the overlooked, vital work of caring for the seriously ill.

This volume conceptualizes caregiving as an emerging sociological issue involving complex and fluctuating roles. The authors contend that caregiving must be considered in the context of the life span with needs that vary according to age, developmental levels, mental health needs and physical health demands of both caregivers and care recipients. As the nature and functions of caregiving evolve it has become a critical and salient issue in the lives of individuals in all demographic, socioeconomic and ethnic categories. This volume frames caregiving as a sociological issue and addresses a number of central concerns, such as: - Caregiving is a life span experience associated with aging and the roles of spouses and adult children. - Caregiving involves a complex of social system variables that influence the social support and services to caregivers and care recipients. - The nature of the relationship among family caregivers, professional caregivers and the care recipient are embedded in their interaction and dynamics influenced by the internal and external variables that inhibit or facilitate the care situation. - How can caregiving be integrated with a public health agenda? - What disparities or inequalities exist in caregiving and what are the barriers that sustain them? - What community-based interventions need to be developed to improve caregiving?

"Diagnosis of a serious disease or disability, many times is more difficult for the caregiver than for the person with the illness. Caregivers: Angels without Wings is a great tribute and support to any caregiver-past, present or future-in one of the most difficult of all human experiences." -Sandy Lahr, RN, Care Share Support Group Facilitator A loved one might suffer with physical health issues but family and friends carry the burden with gentle hands and a heavy heart. Are you a caregiver wondering where to turn or what to do? Whether you are a primary, occasional, or long distance caregiver, you will find moral support and suggestions that will ease your path. Caregivers: Angels without Wings supports you through: Compassionate stories Words of wisdom and sound advice Handy checklists: specific suggestions on lending support "How I wish I had something like this to read during the three months I sat by my mother's bedside, gave her my love, and supported her through a very difficult time. It would have helped me to know I wasn't alone in such an ordeal, and I could have learned from those who have lived through similar challenges." -Anonymous Caregiver

Prepare today’s LPN/LVN students for success on the NCLEX-PN® and in clinical practice with this proven introduction to the essentials of maternity and pediatric nursing. Designed specifically for the LPN curriculum, Introductory Maternity and Pediatric Nursing, 5th Edition, focuses on need-to-know coverage of pregnancy, birth, and pediatrics, combining a clear, straightforward approach with built-in workbook features that reinforce understanding without the need for an additional study guide. Accompanied by engaging online resources, this up-to-date learning package provides the ideal foundation for your students’ success in LPN/LVN practice.

This full-color revision of LPN/LVN level pediatrics text condenses prenatal and newborn coverage and features expanded asthma coverage and care of the well child. The text is organized as follows: chapters on developmental stages (age groups) are followed by chapters covering related and common diseases within each stage/age group. The final unit of the text includes the child with chronic health problems and the dying child. New recurring features include Web activities, pediatric triage checklists, and case studies. Connection Website: connection.LWW.com/go/lpnresources.

Bringing together the human story of care with its representation in film, fiction and memoir, this book combines an analysis of care narratives to inform and inspire ideas about this major role in life. Alongside analysis of narratives drawn from literature and film, the author sensitively interweaves the story of his wife's illness and care to illuminate perspectives on dealing with human decline. Examining texts from a diverse range of authors such as Leo Tolstoy, Edith Wharton and Alice Munro, and filmmakers such as Ingmar Bergman and Michael Haneke, it addresses questions such as why caregiving is a dangerous activity, the ethical problems of writing about caregiving, the challenges of reading about caregiving, and why caregiving is so important. It serves as a fire starter on the subject of how we can gain insight into the challenges and opportunities of caregiving through the creative arts.

Written specifically for the LPN/LVN student, this Third Edition of Introductory Maternity and Pediatric Nursing provides clear, well-illustrated, and clinically relevant coverage of pregnancy, birth, and pediatrics to help student’s master key clinical and critical thinking skills and prepare for the NCLEX® exam and successful practice. This Third Edition is enhanced by new care plans in the clinical chapters, new case studies, a new art program, a new pronunciation guide, and more. Online video clips of live births, Cesarean delivery, breastfeeding, pediatric milestones, the well child, and the hospitalized child bring concepts to life in dynamic full color. To ensure student mastery of key topics, an integrated workbook at the end of each chapter includes NCLEX-style questions (many NEW to this edition), study activities, and critical thinking: "What Would You Do?" exercises.