A New Study: Mindfulness for Mothers of Severely Disabled Children ...

Mindfulness is like that - it is a miracle which can call 
back in a flash our dispersed mind and restore it

to wholeness

so that we can live each minute of life.

Thich Nhat Hanh

Are you caring for a child with severe disabilities? Family caregiving can be hard work at the best of times but caregiving for a child or adult child with a severe disability takes an extra toll. Mothers of children with autism or other neurodevelopmental disabilities report high levels of stress, burnout, compassion fatigue, chronic sorrow, depression, and anxiety, all of which can have an impact on your wellness and resilience and on the way you care for your child.

A new study in the journal Pediatrics suggests that both mindfulness and positive psychology techniques can help to reduce your stress. Researcher, Elisabeth Dykens, and her colleagues randomly assigned 243 mothers to a six-week group treatment program employing either mindfulness techniques like deep-belly breathing or to a group using positive psychology exercises focused on building virtues like gratitude and patience. Trained mentors who also had children with disabilities led the weekly hour-and-a-half sessions. The mothers completed mental health assessments before, during and up to six months after the study. 

Before the study, 85% of the mothers reported significant levels of stress. Forty-one percent suffered from anxiety disorders and forty-eight percent were diagnosed as clinically depressed. (Chronic sorrow was not assessed perhaps altering the number seen as depressed.) 

In the mindfulness group, mentors used the Mindfulness-Bassed Stress Reduction Program (MBSR) developed by Jon Kabat-Zinn to teach breathing awareness, movement and meditation techniques. The specific techniques taught included breathing exercises, self-observation without self-judgement, loving-kindness meditation and Qigong (an ancient Chinese health care system integrating gentle movement, breathing techniques and focused attention) among others.

The positive psychology group learned techniques for dealing with feelings of guilt, worry, and pessimism. The techniques included exercises for identifying character strengths and fostering gratitude, forgiveness, grace and optimism.

Both treatments worked. Participants reported fewer feelings of anxiety and depression and fewer unhealthy parent-child interactions. Mothers slept better and experienced greater life satisfaction during and after the six week groups.  Some continued to improve over time.

Some differences were also noted in the effectiveness of the two groups. The mindfulness group showed more immediate improvement in anxiety, depression and insomnia, possibly due to the immediacy of the autonomic nervous system shift from fight-flight-freeze response to relaxation response. The positive psychology group, on the other hand, took longer to show results but the improvements in life satisfaction and depression were greater.

The study concluded that because both groups saw significant improvement, programs integrating both meditation and positive psychology should be developed.

I think this study provides evidence of a hopeful and practical means of calming the nervous systems of family caregivers, building resilience and improving quality of life. But many of you will look at it and say, "So, who has time to fit this into my already crowded day?!" And you will be right. Few caregivers can "find" the time for new practices like these. It will be more a matter of "carving out" time - giving up something else in order to make room, doing two things at once (eg meditating for the 20 minutes it takes to cook your potatoes), or asking a friend to be with your child as you practice.) However you do it, I think the benefits of adding practices like these to your life might just be worth a try...

*** Caveat:

Please remember that there are those who should not practice mindfulness meditation without first being assessed by their family physician or therapist. They include those who:

• have a history of mental illness or posttraumatic stress
• with thoughts of suicide
• misuse alcohol or other drugs
• are in the first year of addiction recovery
• are troubled by trauma triggers
• have difficulty maintaining a strong sense of self when quiet or alone.

The Rhythms of Nature ...

(

The summer ends and it is time

to face another way.

Wendel Berry

Hi everyone!

It's a beautiful autumn day here in Vancouver - warm and sunny but with a edge to the breeze that reminds me of cooler days to come. This week, I've been taking an online course on the relationship between nature and spirituality and I was struck by this description of the rhythm of the seasons:

When we pay attention to the rhythm of the seasons we learn a great deal about the rise and fall of life, about emptiness and fullness. Spring invites us to blossom forth, summer calls us to our own ripening, autumn demands that we release and let go, and winter quietly whispers to us to rest, to sink into the dark fertile space of unknowing, releasing the demands of productivity and calendars and to do lists and to simply be.

                                                                                                      Christine Paintner

I don't know about you, but that's not the normal pattern of things for me. Autumn and winter are far more likely to be times of compressed do-ing than quiet be-ing. And yet, what a gift we would give to our spirits and bodies if we could follow the natural rhythms of nature and allow a time of fallow, a period of rest that restores our ability to bear fruit.

What if the fall and winter months brought with them an invitation to be less busy, to move inward to a time of quiet, introspection and re-creation?  What if we decided to hibernate, to restrict our kids to a single outside activity per season, said no to recreational screen time and graciously refused a few of our social invitations. What if we made more time for quiet reading, conversation, long walks in the woods and hot drinks by the fire? What if there was sufficient spaciousness for deep reflection, heart connection and even the odd nap?

Now, for some of us, a season of surrender and hibernation could be terrifying. I heard in a CBC radio interview this week that someone had done a study offering participants the choice between a mild electric shock and the boredom of fifteen minutes in a quiet environment and a large percentage actually preferred the electric shock! Are we becoming a society hooked on busyness and stimulation? Perhaps a return to the patterns of nature might allow us to shift our nervous systems back from chronic sympathetic ("flight or flight") arousal to a calmer relaxation response.

I wonder which season would describe your life experience this fall? Are you in sync with the natural flow? Can you be? What (if anything) might you want to change to create a closer parallel between your life and the seasonal rhythm?

Summer Harvest: Or What I (Re)Learned On Summer Vacation ...

Hello, everyone!

I'm back from an unexpectedly busy summer and enjoying the quickening of heart and mind that always seems to accompany this time of year. As the days of summer shorten and I gear up for fall workshops, I find myself reflecting upon the things I've learned (or re-learned) this summer -  the fruits of my summer harvest.

1.  Remember to rest: 

This year's vacation began with two wonderful weeks at Kahshe Lake in northern Ontario. There, my body relaxed and I was reminded, once again, of the importance of rest and respite. Sitting on the deck, doing nothing, wrapped in the piney fragrance of sun-warmed trees is one of the most restorative things I can imagine and yet I can lose track of my need for this deep rest once I move into the busyness of the teaching season.

This year, I've decided to build rest days into the calendar in advance. On these days, I will stay at home by the fire, be silent, avoid screen and phone time, eat pre-prepared meals, perhaps read bits of poetry or fiction, and mostly, just rest. (I did learn this lesson more than ten years ago when my husband was ill but it seems that it takes intentionality and commitment to remember to use it during my busiest times.)

Perhaps you'd like to join me in honouring our universal need for rest and re-creation this fall? If your life won't accommodate a full rest day, perhaps a half day, or a couple of hours, or 30 minutes every morning or a 10 minute power nap in the afternoon would be a place to start ...? The important thing is to choose what works for you and then protect the time to do it.


2. Recommit to a spiritual practice:

As I've said elsewhere, most people believe that we have a spiritual life to tend as well as physical and psychological ones. After a very full late summer with considerable family caregiving and much writing, I found that I had lost the rhythm of two of my much-needed spiritual practices. I was falling asleep during (or sleeping right through) my early morning meditation/prayer time and I was skipping my treasured walks at the lake. (Not a good sign when fall's busyness hadn't yet begun!) Fortunately, I was able to get some rest, and with rest came the desire to refocus on this vital piece of self-care.

Research tells us that developing and maintaining a regular spiritual practice is important for our wellbeing if we want to work with people who are traumatized. Spiritual practice creates space - space for healing and transformation and space for building resilience. Whether you meditate, practice centering prayer, commune with nature, write a gratitude journal, read inspirational writings, dance or sing, or practice a nightly examen, consciously attending to your spiritual life can go a long way toward mitigating compassion fatigue.

If you have had a regular spiritual practice in the past but have let it slip away, why not consider beginning again this fall? First, take some time to consider why you are not practicing now. Has your life changed? Did you become bored with the practice? Was it not a good fit in the first instance?  Once you know why you stopped, begin again or do some exploring to discover new possibilities. Be sure to choose a practice congruent with both your personality and your current life circumstances.

As I re-learned when I returned to my regular practices last week, taking the time to deepen your spiritual life positively affects every other aspect of your being.


3.  Make heart connections with supportive people:

Isolation is both a source and consequence of compassion fatigue. When we hide painful emotional responses to our work, either in the name of strength and stoicism or because there's no energy left to connect with our support systems, we increase the likelihood of being traumatized. And when we become traumatized, we are likely to isolate and hide our trauma for all the same reasons. Isolation becomes entwined in the experience of compassion fatigue and healing involves connecting or reconnecting with loving, responsive supporters.

I felt a measure of this isolation recently, first as I supported an elderly friend for five weeks following emergency surgery and then, as I companioned extended family following a loved one's life-threatening post-transplant lung infection. In the days before I knew about compassion fatigue, I might have spiralled into a state of exhaustion and depletion. Fortunately, these days I can recognize when my early warning signs are saying, "Enough!"  One of those early warning signs is realizing that I haven't had contact with anyone on my KIT (Keeping In Touch) List.

My husband introduced me to the idea of keeping a KIT list. He kept a list of 6 or 8 good friends front-and-centre on his desk and committed to contacting each one at least once a month so that his important relationships could be regularly nourished. Sometimes, he wrote them "proper letters" with envelopes and stamps; sometimes they had coffee or lunch; sometimes they went for walks, hikes or a bike rides; and sometimes they just enjoyed short or protracted phone conversations. The point was that he was intentional about having regular heart-to-heart connection with people who mattered to him. It is this kind of connection that reduces stress and protects both our physical and emotional health. If the idea appeals to you, why not give it a try?


So, these are a few of the summer's lessons for me. What about you? What has been your summer harvest?

Mid-Summer Messages 2014 ...

Hello, everyone,

Just a brief midsummer note to pass along some important messages and to say that I hope you have been able to enjoy some respite time for rest and re-creation these lovely sunny days. Often, as I re-discovered this week, it's our willingness to look outside the box of our usual activities and schedules that allows us to carve out a little space for ourselves.

This is always a busy time of year for me - writing to do, workshops to advertise, handouts to update, registrations to organize. On top of that, for the past 5 weeks I've been carepartnering an 81 year old friend who had emergency surgery while I was away at the cottage this summer. It's been hectic and I find that I can get so caught up in the organized chaos that I can forget that the sun is shining out there and that I need to take advantage of this beautiful city before the rains come. That thought came to me (once again) in the early hours of yesterday morning and so, when my friend, Sandra, mentioned going to see Walking the Camino: Six Ways to Santiago at the VanCity Theatre last night, I bit the bullet and asked to go along.

What a great decision and what a wonderful evening! Not only was the VIFF-selected film beautifully photographed, written and edited, (and the theme of slowing down didn't hurt either!) but our walk through Granville Island, the ride across False Creek on the Aquabus as the sun was setting, and the further walk up Hornby, down Davie and up Seymour gave us the opportunity to see a broad cross-section of Vancouver's eclectic summer life. The trip back was just as lovely and made more so by our stop at the GI Gelato and Coffee House for a carmel ripple gelato cone to lick as we walked along the seawall and talked. It was such a good choice to make space for feeding my senses and spending time with a good friend, even though I thought I was "too tired"and "too busy".  This morning, I feel re-energized and ready to take on the world.

That said, I have some news for you:


1.  David Daniels (see my previous post) has done extremely well following his open heart surgery and is already attending Enneagram meetings so thank you so much for all the prayers and positive intentions that helped to carry him and his family through.


2.   Unexpectedly, I have had to change venues for my fall workshops and the change has caused an alteration in the workshop scheduling. The great folks at Christ Church Cathedral, in the midst of downtown Vancouver, at Burrard and Georgia Streets, have come to my rescue with the offer of their beautiful Park Room, but scheduling has suffered a little:

a.  The October 3rd family caregivers workshop will be moved to the New Year. (Date and venue tba)

b.  The Caring On Empty Workshop for Helping Professionals will be held on Saturday November 8 rather than Friday November 7 as previously scheduled.

c.  The Introduction to the Enneagram Workshop will still be held on Friday November 28.

I'm very sorry for the inconvenience for any of you who have already made plans around the original dates.


Brochures for the fall workshops will be available by the end of the month. If you wish to be added to the mailing list, please email me your personal email address at caregiverwellness@shaw.ca

Intentions for David Daniels ...

Hello, everyone,

A few posts ago, I wrote about the new Enneagram website at Enneagram Worldwide. In that post, I mentioned Dr David Daniels, professor of clinical psychiatry and behavioural sciences at Stanford School of Medicine, one of my beloved Enneagram teachers and mentors, and the author of The Essential Enneagram.

This evening I received an email from Terry Saracino, President of Enneagram Worldwide, sharing the news that David will be having a mitral valve replacement on Tuesday July 15th, his second open heart surgery in two years.

Terry has asked for our prayers and positive intentions for David and his family and I echo that request here. David is enormously grateful for the support already beginning to pour in from around the world. His family have requested that those of you who know David follow his progress in the journal entries on CaringBridge rather than contacting him directly. Just use the CaringBridge link and type in David Neil Daniels to reach his private webpage. (There are two David Daniels webpages so be sure to type in his middle name.)

David has touched many, many lives over the years through both his writing and teaching. Those of us in the Narrative Tradition community of Enneagram teaching have benefitted beyond words from his quiet wisdom, wry sense of humour and consummate skill at interviewing panel participants. Having had the honour of being a participant on two of his panels, I can say that they are nothing short of life-changing. We need many more years of his warm and loving presence among us.

Thank you so much for your support for David and his family,

Jan

ps I think the whole core team at Enneagram Worldwide - Terry, Helen Palmer, Peter O'Hanrahan, Marion Gilbert and Renee Rosario - could do with our warm intentions as well. David is one of the co-founders of Enneagram Worldwide and an important component in the glue that holds the team together.

Summer Camping for Family Caregivers ...

Hi everyone!

I'm back from a wonderful two weeks at the cottage and am beginning to take on the tasks of real life again. While standing in line at the grocery store this morning, I heard the mom of a disabled child commenting to a friend that camping was great but not exactly a rest for moms. Then, later in the morning, I received an email containing the following poem written by Luci Shaw from her book, Water Lines:

Camping

The river rushes along in a hurry
to get somewhere. Our tent is pitched close;
above the oxymoron of its noisy hush
we, in folding chairs on the bank,
wait to slow down, to let the mind wander,
to to turn primitive. Simplicity
is what we say we want - the current's
single-mindedness, even its monotony.

A week goes by. It would be so good
to be aimless. To be content to be aimless.

But we are mothers, keepers of homes.
At the campsite we work to keep the firewood dry,
the butter cool, the food secure from bears.
the tent zipped against mosquitoes,
the water heating for coffee.

We are caught - neither civilized or wild.
Even in the deep forest the houses in town call us,
the families, the phone messages, the bills to be paid,
the laundry; our guilt is alive and waiting.

Out in the centre of the riverbed a single boulder,
embedded in a pebble shoal, sun-washed, gleams.


The message I took from the busy mom's comment, and the poem that followed, is that trying to maintain a normal life for families while caring for an ill or disabled loved one is hard work, even - or especially - during vacation and holiday times.

The picture above was taken of my goddaughter and her mom while we were camping at Porteau Cove many years ago. Her mom, a carepartner extraordinaire, managed to do everything mentioned in the poem and more, but I'm sure that, given half a chance, she would have hired a caregiver's caregiver to come along and allow her some time to taste the simplicity and monotony she was creating so generously for us.

So, if you're camping with a family caregiver this weekend, perhaps you could offer to cook a meal or cut some firewood or do a round of dishes so she can rest awhile in one of those folding chairs ...? She (or he) certainly deserves it!

Books For the Cottage ...

Hi everyone,

I was in the midst of packing this morning when I realized that I hadn't posted my usual summer reading list. Instead, I'll offer you the the titles I'm taking with me to the cottage. I hope something here tweaks your interest:

1.  Poemcrazy: Freeing Your Life With Words by Susan Goldsmith Wooldridge (1997) This wee book is a lovely, joyful collection of meditations and techniques for approaching the art of poetry writing. (And I love the picture on the cover!)

2.  Meeting the English by Kate Clanchy (2013) This "bright story about dark subjects" begins with the main character answering an ad - "Literary Giant seeks young man to push bathchair. Own room in Hampstead, all found, exciting cultural milieu. Modest wage. Ideal 'gap year' opportunity. Apply Prys Box 4224XXC."  This book was placed in every room of the small boutique hotel in London where my good friend, Elaine, spent the last night of her British vacation last year. She says its an easy, moving read.

3. River Flow: New and Selected Poems by David Whyte (Revised edition 2012) This is the description of River Flow copied from its back cover - River Flow contains over one hundred poems selected from five previously published works, together with 23 new poems, including a tribute to an Ethiopean woman navigating her first escalator, a meditation of love and benediction for a young daughter and a cycle of Irish poems that convey a deep love of the land and a lifelong appreciation for its wisdom.

4.  Learning to Walk in the Dark by Barbara Brown Taylor (2014)  This is a spiritual exploration of the positive aspects of darkness from the New York Times best selling author of Leaving Church. She writes: Darkness is shorthand for anything that scares me - either because I am sure that I do not have the resources to survive it or because I do not want to find out. 

If I had my way, I would eliminate everything from chronic back pain to the fear of the devil from my life and the lives of those I love. At least I think I would. The problem is this: when, despite all my best efforts, the lights have gone off in my life, plunging me into the kind of darkness that turns my knees to water, I have not died. The monsters have not dragged me out of bed and taken me back to their lair. 

Instead, I have learned things in the dark that I could never have learned in the light, things that have saved my life over and over again, so that there is really only one logical conclusion. I need darkness as much as I need light.

5.  Hunting Shadows by Charles Todd (2014) This is the latest in the Inspector Ian Rutledge mystery series, set in post WW I England. Inspector Rutledge has returned from war suffering from severe posttraumatic stress and the series investigates the usual number of murders and other crimes in tandem with the process of Rutledge's emotional suffering and healing. This edition is set at Ely Cathedral in Cambridgeshire, a community I know well from visits with my husband's dear cousin, Evelyn. I will enjoy reading the descriptions of familiar haunts.

That's it for me. Off to finish packing! Again, happy summer to you all!