Building Your Caregiving Team: The Benefits and How to Lead

Who's on your caregiving team?  When caregivers take a step back and look at their team and see the importance of the services, support and help, they'll be able to embrace the moments and joy in their journey.  

In this episode, we're unpacking:

• who's on your team
• benefits of your team
• thinking like a leader to that team
• tips and information on how to form and lead a caregiver team

Transcript

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SPEAKER_00 0:00

Well, my friend, hello, and welcome to another episode of the Caregiver Cup Podcast. I'm really excited about today's episode. And I know I say this every time, but this one I've had on my list for a while. This topic is something that I am really, really passionate about. And by the way, I was going to go ahead and name my podcast episode about being a CEO of your caregiver life. But as I was researching and doing all of that, it sounded more like a corporation than it than it did the caregiver cup. And so I kind of bowed away from it. But that doesn't mean I wasn't passionate about this topic. And each and every day, you and I are CEOs. And you and I are leaders of this caregiver life. You're the one that is taking care of your loved one. You're the one that's managing everything. You're the one who's coordinating and making sure everything works. And so sometimes we don't take a step back and think about us as a leader. And today, that's what I'm going to talk all about. I'm going to break this all down and talking about who is on your team. What do you do as a leader? What are the benefits of having a think having a team and thinking like the CEO of this team? And so I'm going to break this all down. I want to start out though with a story from my corporate life, my corporate job that really aligns with what we're talking about. So bear with me. One of the roles that I had, and it was kind of like an ad hoc on role to my job, somebody needed to go ahead and create this tour guide program and coordinate it. Because in the building that we were in, it had about 3,000 people in our building, and it was one of our main headquarters. And we would bring in guests into our building. And when we brought in guests, we needed somebody to give them a tour of the building and not only just walk around and saying, here's this and here's that and here's that. It was more of creating a and getting them to understand the culture, listening to stories from the tour guides, getting the history of the company, and much, much more. And so when I was handed this project and this ad hoc job, I was thinking, oh yeah, okay, I need tour guides. I need to make sure that we have, we understand what we're going to be content we're going to be giving in the tour. We need to map out the tour. And then I needed to go ahead and select tour guides that were appropriate and professional enough. And then they all needed to have a dress code so that we all dress the same. And that's what I thought about it. And then each and every time there was a tour, I would be alerted. I would go ahead and schedule them and manage the tour. Well, it ended up to be a lot more than that once I dug into the whole tour guide process because I had to understand what the purpose of the tour was, who the audience was. And then I uncovered a lot of things regarding the tour that I didn't really think about along the way. And I'm going to share some of these as I go through the episode. So you're going to hear me bouncing from the tour guide program and then caregiving. And I'm going to kind of bounce it back and forth, kind of like you're watching a Netflix movie. And sometimes you're like, okay, they're going back to this story, and then they're going to this story. And I promise I will make sure that these all align and you're, it's going to make total sense of it. So my motto when I was the tour guide coordinator, ad ad hoc person was my motto was to build a strong and supportive team. And same with you when it comes to caregiving. So what does this mean? You I needed a small army of people who would commit to making the sacrifices to support the tour guide because they were people that were going, they were people that were answering phones. They were in the call center, or they were managing a team, or they were running the copy center. They were from all walks of life. And so I needed to make sure that I had commitment from them. And so that was an important piece for me. Same with you when you're building your strong and supportive team. You want to make sure you have an army of people who will commit to making sacrifices to support your loved one and you. Not saying it wasn't, but it's kind of like when you bring somebody home to your house, you throw everything into your closet or you hide all of the clutter. So it looks very welcoming. So some of the obvious maybe team members that you think about from a caregiving perspective is who else can help me? Like family? Is there siblings? Is there other family members that can help me? Are there friends that you can lean on that potentially can help you with some of the job responsibilities or task responsibilities that you have as a caregiver? And then what are some of the non-obvious things but very needed? And we're going to break these down when we talk about those, some of the non-obvious things. Like I'm going to sneak one in because I'm the type of person that never can wait and tell the surprise. I have to tell you a little bit of a like a cliffhanger first. But let's say that you are going to be in with your loved one for a long day, a 10-hour day. And so some of the non-obvious things are okay, how who's going to let out the dog while I'm with uh why I'm away for those 10 hours? Or how am I going to prepare a meal? Those kind of things. So those could be potential non-obvious team members that you need that you don't even think about. Some other things that you want to think about when it comes to building a supportive and a strong team. Are they trustworthy? Are they, meaning, are they holding things like sensitive in info and private information? Are they respecting privacy? Because let's say somebody needs to be your driver or pick up your medications because you're you don't have time to do that. Are they respectful? There's nothing worse than having this gossiper that's going to tell everybody about them driving your loved one back home because you had another appointment that you have to attend to and they're now making you feel guilty. You know, that's not a strong and supportive team member. You also need team members that are emotionally intelligent because you're dealing with tough stuff. You're dealing with healthcare systems and personalities of people and different doctors and stuff like that. And so you need somebody to be strong and leaving their ego at the door and being emotionally intelligent enough not to upset your loved one, upset you. You also need somebody reliable and punctual. Um, for example, if if you need somebody to drive your loved one to an appointment because you are working your full-time job, they need to be on time or respect that your loved one likes to be there early and picking them up, being reliable. Um, and if they're, you know, if they're giving them meds that day, maybe you needed to go ahead and you needed your physical that day. And somebody is sitting with your loved one and you say they need their meds at such and such a time, that means such and such a time. And so that's an important piece. You also on your team may need people that are emotionally strong, somebody, people with positive mindsets, somebody that's honest and open with you, especially when you are not, especially when you are stressed and you need somebody. And right away, I think about um, you know, somebody that's emotionally strong when I was in this caregiving mode. If my guests didn't show up on time and they had appointments at the top of the hour after, I needed somebody that the caregiving tour guides that were emotionally strong to say, okay, you're gonna have to reduce your tour from 45 minutes to 30 minutes. And so I want you to think about where you can cut 30 minutes of your time. Do you skip a, do you skip a wing? Do you shorten your speech? Do you only take them to a cert part of the building? I need you to be thinking on your feet and emotionally strong and positive and saying, yes, I can figure this out. I know what I have to do, and they'll be at the the next pit stop at a such and such a time. So why do you need a team? And why do you want a team as a caregiver? First of all, if you're saying no right now, I want you to really think about this. You already have a team, you already have a team, but I want you to think about this team from a CEO or a leader mindset because having a caregiving team can provide you with a range of benefits for both your loved one and yourself. Think about things like it can enhance your care coordination or your overall job as a caregiver. A team can help coordinate the your loved one's care, can ensure that all aspects of their care are covered and no important details are missed. Let's say that you have somebody on like your sibling is the the strong person that can really coordinate the times and all of that kind of stuff. Maybe you offer them saying, Hey, here's my calendar. Can you go ahead and get mom in for her three radiation therapies? And maybe that's the strength. Or maybe you are the person that does the scheduling, but you have somebody else that takes care of the insurance calls, whatever it would be. So think about who can help you with that coordination of care or who already does. Having a team can improve the quality of your care. With a team, the caregiver can delegate tasks to others who are better equipped or better skilled or have the strengths, and they can do things faster. What comes to my mind is when my dad had chemotherapy, and my brother and I and my mom got together and they determined, Kathy, you have the skill sets that can go ahead and process all of my dad had cancer insurance, which was a supplemental plan. My dad had also his Medicare and he had his supplemental regular insurance. And my sister tried to do it, and she's like, oh my God, I can't handle waiting on hold, listening to elevator music for 45 minutes, and then telling, having somebody tell me that I have to submit this in by going online. And so that's perfectly fine because I knew my sister's skill set was in the nursing side. And so that's kind of how we did it. Uh, think about a team can help you reduce your caregiver stress because we all know that caring for our loved ones can be overwhelming and stressful. And so by look lifting some of those extra responsibilities off your plate, so you can focus on what your job is. And then you also need to focus on your own needs and your own well-being. Because remember, you're in it for the long haul. And so you're the main primary caregiver. And so you have to think about yourself being able to sustain this long journey. You know, overall the benefits of having a team is you have increased support, you have emotional support, you have physical support, you have skill, different skill sets that can help you through. And so being able to identify what everybody's skill sets are and where they can support, and then being able to divvy some of those up is going to be a really important thing. Even if you're a control freak, because that's where I came from. I was more of a control freak and I, it was hard for me. But when you think about your team as more resources and more expertise and people that have valuable skill sets, like in the medical issues or complex, complex care needs, or they have patience, or they're good at cooking, or they they don't mind cleaning up my house. Those are the team members that you also want to take advantage of. And having a caregiving team can provide you with benefits of better communications because a team can ensure that everyone is on the same page and has the same information, reducing the risk. You're gonna find out that your communication skills are going to improve. You're going to be able to go ahead and when you take things off of your plate, you're gonna see things clearer. You're gonna also find that you have more flexibility to take a break and to take care of things that have you haven't been able to take care of, and simply having some time for yourself. And that's an important piece. So remember having a team can have so many benefits and can make you even stronger when you think like a leader. So let's talk about who is your team right now. If you're listening and you have the capability right now to grab a piece of paper and hit the pause button in just a second here and write down some things, I want you to do that. If not, after this episode, I want you to think about this. And I want you to hopefully in your journal or when you get a few minutes, I want you to write down who is on your team right now. So if you hit that pause button, that's what I want you to do. Who is on your team right now? Okay, come on back now and take a look at that list. Now, as you listen further and you hear more things, I want you to add these people to your list if they are part of your team. Because we may not even think they are part of our team because it's just something that we go to. But think about who's on your medical team for your loved one because they're part of your team. You're the caregiver and you're the loved one. You both are a team together, but then you also have a team, a team around you that are working on the cause of helping your loved one, curing your loved one, managing your loved one, taking care of them. And so any nurses, therapists, doctors, surgeons, whether you see them one time and they're done, they are all team members to you. They are all, you're all working on the same purpose. And so when you think about them as a team member versus somebody that's higher up than you or somebody that has a different profession than you, you're going to be able to go ahead and connect with them more and communicate them with them more. Dennis had wonderful nurse navigators. As a matter of fact, some of the skill sets that I gained when we started meeting the nurse navigators was if I have questions after we leave here today, or if Dennis has questions after we leave here today, how do we get in touch with you? And I could put the nurse navigators for his cancer care, I could put their names into my phone because they were teams. Most of the time it was their business line, but I had one nurse navigator that gave me her cell phone number. I didn't abuse it, but I had her there. I could connect with her, I could talk with her on issues. When my mom was in hospice care, we had our hospice team. We had the hospice nurse, we had the hospice so social worker, we had the hospice chaplain. Then they connected us with the funeral home director who was part of our team. We connected with our own church, which the priest was part of our team. So we formed our team. When I say we, I talk about my brother and my sister. And I we had our team for mom during that last month. It's your medical team too, not just your loved ones' team. It's your medical team too. Because don't think that the social worker was there for my mom. The social worker was also there for my brother and my sister and myself. They were supporting us. Another thing that you want to think about is your faith. Do you have a community? You have a church community that's your team. Do you have your uh a clergy, a priest, a chaplain, whatever your faith would be? My dad, in his last months, he had hit part of his team was the priest visits, the clergy support visits, the church community dropping off meals for my family. It was there they're saying prayers for us during service. They were our faith community, our faith team that was supporting us, sending us cards, sending, dropping off things at the doorstep. And when you think about that, that's part of your team. They lift you up, they support you. They may be silent team members at times, but they're team members. We talked about your family. Who's your family team members? Your siblings, your brothers, your sisters. Now, some may be active supporters, some team members you may not even hear from, and that's okay. And that's okay. Those are your quiet team members or the team members that you're you maybe don't want part of your team. Family may be your children, it may be your aunts and your uncles. Way, way back when my husband's dad passed away. My husband Dennis had his aunt at his side because my dad, my husband Dennis, had to make the hard medical decisions about removing the life support system, helping with, you know, getting extra care during the hospice in the hospital. And so Dennis's team was his aunt, was his brothers, was his sisters, uh, was the nursing staff, was the neighbors helping at the house, and so on, which leads me into the neighbors. What do you have people around you like your neighbors that help you from a homebound perspective? I've had so many wonderful friends and neighbors dropping off meals at the doorstep, a hot pot of chicken noodle soup, or Andy next door doing the snow blowing, or neighbors and friends taking care of the dogs and letting them out while we were away in those long days, or when we were at the stem cell transplants, all of the people that did the dog walkings every day. Friends that would come over and visit my loved one or visit me on the porch or the patio. Uh, friends that would call me up, like my friend Denise, to say, I need to go ahead and see you. Do you want to get out of the house? Can we go for a walk? How wonderful is that? Those people don't necessarily service your loved one all the time, but they're servicing you. They're supporting you on your team. Okay, another one that you can think about is the healthcare system. And besides the doctors and the nurses and the therapists that are performing the actual services for your loved one, what are the other, I always call them yucky things behind the scenes that you have to take care of? You know, you have the insurance company, you have the financial advisors uh for that. We had even the healthcare system and connecting the dots here right now is the nurse navigators identified financial support and grants and nonprofits that could support us. At one point uh during my husband's journey, there was a nonprofit organization that came in and set up a tree for us during the Christmas holidays. Oh my gosh, talking about a team that would recognize that and the nurse navigator offering that as support and us saying yes to it. Uh when my dad was uh in his treatments, I met with a financial advisor at in the hospital to talk about how is this all working? That was part of my team. I got her card, I had on my phone uh during Dennis' stem cell transplant. Dave was the case manager for Dennis's stem cell transplant. He talked to Dennis, he talked to me. We had him on speed dial some days, and he supported us. He was part of our team. So, in addition to that, who is on your team? Now, you may not like all the people on your team, but you have to recognize they are team members. They are going to be people that you're gonna have to learn how to communicate with or give feedback to or have conversations with. Think about all of the things too from a house support perspective that you may not be able to do all alone. I think about dentists used to do all the cutting and the lawn work and the handy man fix-up stuff. Well, when your loved one is sick, who takes care of that kind of stuff? Who does all of that kind of stuff? You may have to have a house cleaner coming in or friends that will go ahead and help you with some of the house cleaning, or somebody that's going to cut the lawn or take care of the lawn. They are part of your team. Or maybe you're plumbing or something with your electricity goes down. You have to look to say, okay, who do I call? Who's going to be part of this team? Because in the past my husband would take care of it. Now I have to take care of it. Even things like people that do the deliveries for you. I have the best postman. He's not there every day of the week, but Scott delivers our mail for us and talks to us and whatever. And I would let him know hey, I'm not going to be home. Can you tuck this stuff into the corner? Or hey, it's nice to see you. I've been away for a while and blah, blah, blah. When you have connections, and sometimes Scott, our postman, it wasn't really his service. It was talking to somebody that maybe I didn't talk to anybody for the whole entire day. And I got to talk to and wave to Scott and say three words to him today. And I'm like, oh my God, I talked to somebody today. That kind of thing. You know, do you and you think of your team too as maybe you pick up groceries? Hey, that's that's team support, right? Or the cashier that's checking you out is supporting you. The pharmacist, if you have a specific pharmacist that you go to and you need to talk to them about your loved one's care, any type of maybe your maybe your team is not even a person. Maybe your team is electronic support, like something automated. Maybe you went out to Amazon now, and instead of having your laundry soap picked up every every month, now you have just have it delivered to your house because you don't have time. That is part of your team. Maybe it's car maintenance and you have, you know, you have a service person that you go to. So another thing is if you're working your job or your business, do you have a boss or do you have a team there? That's part of now your caregiving team as well. It's an offshoot, but it's part of that. Also think about where you are getting your emotional support or your mental support. Do you have a support team? Remember, I have the caregiver cup circle. Each and every month you can go ahead and enroll in the caregiver cup circle, and it's a community. That's your team. That's part of that fills your cup from an isolation perspective, a challenge perspective, an emotional perspective. Um, maybe you have an accountability group or a person that you talk to on a daily basis. That's your support. When I was at the in the stem cell transplant process away from home for six weeks, my accountability partners were my friend Julie and my mom. And I FaceTimed my mom every night. I texted my friend Julie every day. And they were part of my team. They helped me through the good times and the bad times. Maybe you have a trainer or you go to the gym, and that's part of your team, whatever it would be. And then also think about your personal stuff. What makes you feel good? What makes you look good? What makes you perform better? And maybe it's your hairdresser. Hey, Laura's part of my team. She dyes my hair every five weeks so that it looks amazing and trims it and keeps it up. I cherish that time that I have. And she should be my psychotherapist as well because she talks to me and keeps me up on those days that I have were down. Maybe you have a masseuse that you go to that helps you, or a chiropractor, or whatever. Uh, maybe it's your nail technician or somebody that takes care of something like some of your nails or a makeup consultant, whatever it would be. Then do you have somebody that you speak to? Do you have a therapist or counselor? They are definitely part of your team. Do you have a coach? Remember, I'm a caregiver coach. I'm not a licensed therapist or counselor, but I'm a coach that can help you with strategies and help you with efficiencies and time management so that you can spend more time with your loved one and help you recognize if you're not filling your cup or how to fill your cup. Also, maybe you have a podcast and you have a mentor that you listen to each and every day. If you go to the Caregiver Cup podcast right now, you're listening right now. I'm hopefully part of your team, or you have a course that you go to. So these are things. If you were had a list of your team and now you're adding things to it, I'm saying kudos to you because as a caregiver, you have to have a team surrounding you. A good CEO of a company has many people that support them and lift them up and that provide services so that they can be the best they can be. So I want to tie back in my tour guide story. Having tour guides was an important piece to having tours, right? That's the obvious piece, but there were so many other extras that were key to making sure the tours were successful. And I already talked about maintenance because maintenance needed to be there. I also needed to ensure that there was catering in place because when the tour was either over or we were at a point, I needed to have some bottles of water there. These people were walking around, these people were going ahead and just came off of a bus usually, and they had meetings afterwards, but some of them really needed something while they were doing that. And I found that having some catering needs along the way, they could grab something and take the tour. Um, and the tour guides needed also to look good, and so I needed to create a dress code for them with strong expectations that they did that at the time. And now I think times have changed a little bit, but we all agreed to having um dress codes be in navy blue or gray, so it's so corporate here, and they needed to have a collared shirt with a blazer, and they needed to have dress-up shoes, that kind of thing. And we had to have a badge for them, and they had this fun little badge, and so that was part of the atmosphere. Um, I also needed to go ahead and provide them with scripting so that they could they knew what to say. And then what was really crazy is I needed to map out routes, routes around the building, because at some points we would have five tours going on at the same time, five tours of 10 people. And so we needed to go ahead and map out routes so that we wouldn't have two tour guides talking about the same thing at the same time, or we wouldn't have crowds running together. And then we needed to have training to practice how to walk because when you're walking with a tour, you can't keep walking straight. So these tour guides needed to learn how to talk and back up, talk and back up, and they needed to walk backwards, and so just some of the things that they needed to work on, and then they needed to work on the volume of their voice, where to bring the group, and then they had to walk into the middle. So we had tons of things that we needed to work on. We also needed to have support to make sure everything worked out. We incorporated having two tour guides with each group. We called one the the tour guide, and then the the person in the back, we called them the caboose. We wanted it to be something fun. They talked too, but they only talked as a support person. And so just little things like that. Uh, they we learned I learned that we also needed to rely on the entire group experience because most of our tours were coming in for more than just a tour. They were coming in for a meeting after, they were coming in for an event after, and we needed to be at the center of all of the things that we're going in on. We needed to know where they were going after, where they came from before, what were the topics, what were their challenges, what were their questions. And then when we got questions, how do we go ahead and communicate that? And so instead of being a tour guide team, we were part of the bigger team. And that's what I'm trying to get at with the caregiving. And start instead of just being your loved one's team, you need to be part of the entire process so that you are known. And as a matter of fact, I made it a point as a tour guide. I called myself the tour guide project manager, and then eventually became the project manager of the event. So that, and I was the leader of the event because there were too many gaps and too many things, and everybody was siloed and so once we became one big huge team. Oh my gosh, it was such a well-oiled machine. It was such a well-oiled machine. And I miss it today, but I also am so grateful that I had the experience. So getting back to thinking like a leader, thinking like a CEO, care, caregiver CEO, getting to think like a leader of this team can take some time and effort. It can it takes your mindset mindset a bit to think about how does this all work? Why do I have to do that? But an important mindset to cultivate this. And I want to talk about some tips to being and thinking like a leader of your caregiving team. And I want us the tip number one is to think strategically. When you think about a leader, the leader needs to be able to think strategically about how to achieve the goal of your loved one, right? Encouraging you as a leader or as a caregiver leader to take a step back and think about this big picture, identifying the most important priorities first and creating a plan to achieve them. So, if like for me, when I took a step back and looked at, I have to be away from home for six entire weeks at least for caregiving dentists at from the stem cell transplant. I had to look at everything. I had to look at home, I had to look at my job, I had to look at dentist's care, I had to look at the place we were staying, I had to look at how I was going to nurse as when we were doing an outpatient and much more. So you're taking a step back. And then you have to help, then it what it does is it helps you develop communication skills and this strategic plan because effective communication is key for you as a leader. You have to go ahead and really set strong expectations or saying this is what I need, and then knowing how to communicate and listen to things and how things are going or how what challenges are we encountering. For example, this is a minor example, but it's it's an important example too, because my girlfriend Julie took my dogs for a walk and she signed up for like five times. And after the first time, because she's so nice, and I'm sure my dogs just walked all over her, they pulled so hard on the leash, two 70-pound plus dogs on the leashes that she hurt her shoulder. And she kept saying her shoulder is sore. And I'm like, I had to listen and I had to say to myself, okay, I don't want her to walk my dogs, but she wants to be actively involved. So I'm gonna ask her to come over and visit my mom because my mom needed social support. And it's okay to skip the dog's walks every other day or see if there's my boys can walk them. And I was able to fill in the blanks and stuff. And so that was one example. Another point is to emphasize the importance of delegation because you, as a leader, need to go ahead and be okay with delegating your tasks, the ones that maybe you've all carried for so long and it's so much, and you just physically can't do it. I right away I think about can you do the lawn, do the housework, take your loved one to chemotherapy appointments three times this week, work your full-time job, cook the meals, do all the laundry, run to the pharmacy appointment, do the grocery shopping, uh pick up miscellaneous things at the at the store that you need. And oh, by the way, uh the uh bathroom sink is clogged right now, and your loved one needs to go ahead and get bathed and showered and brush his teeth, and the the tub and the sink are clogged. Okay, that's just the day and the week of a caregiver, right? At one point you have to say to yourself, I can't do everything. So effective communication and effective delegation is a strong suit when you become a caregiver leader. You can ask for help, you can go ahead and take some of those things off your plate. And it's okay if the neighbor cuts the lawn and he misses a strip of grass. It's gonna be okay. Or it's okay if you know somebody comes into your home and does your cleaning and you're not you weren't comfortable at first with that. So when you are a leader, you're encouraging collaboration and cooperation amongst the team members. You're building confidence amongst yourself and you're building strengths and moving from uncomfortable to comfortable. And what what's one thing that you want to continue to do is you want To encourage and and thank the people for doing it. And it's okay because you're gonna have to learn to go ahead and give good feedback, and you're gonna have to encourage people to say, Hey, thank you. I can't thank you enough for cutting the lawn and doing everything. Can I ask you the next time you do it? Can you push the lawn more back into the shed? Because it really bugged Bob or whatever, bugged Dennis or whatever, you know, that kind of thing. And then what it does for you is now you have a resource and a support system, and it's going to go ahead and tap you into a stronger, stronger leader and a mentor program. And you're going to go ahead and build these great coaching skills that you never thought you would have. Because as a care, I'm going to go back to the tour guide. As a tour guide coordinator, that's what they wanted me to do. I really shifted my role and communicated this with my leader. I was more than that. In that role, I was an interviewer and went through a selection process with the tour guides. I coordinated all of the processes. I designed all of the content and the mapped out the routes. I project managed the entire process eventually. I was a mentor. I provided feedback. I had to go ahead and let go of some tour guides. And most importantly, I became a strong leader. And it wasn't just about picking the people and giving them scripting and telling them how to dress and do the task. There were so many little pieces and partnerships that I created. Oh my gosh, once I created a partnership with the maintenance staff, I got so many fun little perks. They actually, like one time, my car wouldn't start. And I walked back into the lobby and I'm like, okay, my car isn't starting. I'm going to wait in here and try to get a hold of my spouse or the triple A service. And the maintenance guy came and he's like, Kathy, come with me. We're going to jump your car and you'll be all set. And so I got some of those perks because you build relationships and you start forming that. And people then start connecting with you more. So as a caregiver, you have to take a step back and look at the at your list right now. Do you have a complete team? Do you have somebody that can take some things off of your plate? And heck, you can try it. And if it doesn't work, try something else. You can have the neighbor come and cut the lawn. And if you don't like it, well, the next time you can ask your son. And maybe that would work better. Or if that doesn't work. And maybe you don't have the money to go ahead and hire somebody. But you know what? Family and friends are always saying, What can I do to help? So I'm going to ask you this. What are you doing that you can ask a team member to help you with? What are you doing right now that you could ask what you could take something off your plate? Create your team, or better yet, your board of support, your board of directors, because that's what you're doing. As a caregiver, forming and leading a team can be crucial to providing the best possible care for your loved one. And once you identify your needs and make a list of your needs and all of the people that are already supporting you, you can keep building on that. You can keep building on it. The best team members that Dennis had during his knee surgery was friends. I would text his friends and saying, Hey, Brian, what are you doing in the next week? Would you mind coming over and just visiting Dennis because he is down? And then I can go ahead and do X, Y, and Z. Oh my gosh, I love those days. Also, reach out to potential team members. Once you've identified your needs and you can go ahead and start asking people, maybe you have a line of communication saying, hey, I want to form a team. And I'm going to use Facebook group as an example. I'm going to use a Facebook group and I want to form a team of support. And I'm going to list out everything that I need. Some people couldn't offer support when we were in Milwaukee and they wanted to. And they said, I feel so bad that I can't get down to Milwaukee to help you, Kathy. And I'm like, I know what you can do to help me. You can go ahead and send us a card every day. Or you can send us a text, send Dennis a text, whatever. And they were like, oh my gosh, we're on top of it. As a matter of fact, my friend's mom, Julie, her name's Joan, she did not miss with the cards. She would always send us a card just saying, How are you doing? What are you doing? And then once you form your team, you can ext, you can establish, I can't say it, clear communications. I had a Facebook group and a text group because I had two, I had my close team, like my immediate family team, and then I had a bigger team of anybody that had interest. And so I would be able to go ahead and say, hey, I'm looking for somebody to go ahead and like my close team, anybody available to leave the dog out because I thought we were going to be home at one, and now it looks like we're not going to be home till four o'clock. Is anybody there? And then I could go ahead and tell them how to get into the house, tell them how to take care of it. And it was nice. And then that gives you the ability to assign tasks and responsibilities. You can go ahead and post things out there. And it allows you some flexibility, like we had talked about. And then when you go ahead and they help you, show appreciation. Go into that, go into that Facebook group or that text group and saying, kudos, thank you. And other people are going to recognize, oh, she got, she helped. And then they're going to come back. And then I always had in my grab and go bag, I always had thank you cards in there. And I would, because I have so much time on my hands, I would write thank you notes or I'd send a verbal thank you text to somebody that's helping me right now. And I would either mail it or drop it off or whatever. And the biggest thing for you when you become a leader, you're taking care of yourself. It's not selfish to go ahead and lean on your team. As a matter of fact, it's so necessary. You need rest, you need to eat well, you need to take breaks to go ahead and be the best that you can be. And so when you form a team and then you start leading like a leader, it can be the most empowering feeling and the most empowering thing that you can do for your loved one and for you. And as a matter of fact, what I did when Dennis was feeling better, I would say, okay, I'm just using this as an example. Johnny is part of our team that's going ahead and I'll use Andy. Andy's part of our team and he's taking care of the snow blowing for us while we're in Milwaukee. Dennis, would you mind going going ahead and sending him a thank you note and asking him how the gas is and do you need anything and whatever? And so if we needed more gas for the snowblower, then we could go ahead and Venmo him some money so we could go fill up the gas can, you know, that kind of thing. And it just made for, and actually, it made for we strengthened our relationships. It made the team members feel like they were part of something and they were helping. And we felt like we built friendships and we built relationships as well. So I'd love to hear what you thought about the this whole episode. This whole episode on taking off your caregiver lenses and putting on a stronger lens to being a leader of this caregiver life that you have, being the CEO of your caregiver life and being the best you can be. Because when you become this leader, and if you're already a leader, keep developing those skills. Because when you become the leader, the sky's the limit. You can go ahead and be the best you can be. You're getting better at communications, you're able to go ahead and handle challenges better. And most importantly, you have time to fill your cup. Well, you have a good rest of the day, and we'll talk to you again next week. If you have any comments or suggestions or insights into this episode, I would truly love to hear from you. If you could give me a review, that helps me tons, tons and gets this to more caregivers. Also, if you have something that you really want to share personally with me, definitely direct message me. I'm on Instagram at Kathy Lynn Van. Or better yet, share this in share this podcast on your social media site. Tag me in it and let let others see this and let's help other caregivers. We are a team together here today. We are a caregiver team. Let's build this team of caregivers so that they can see that there is hope and there is solutions to this big, challenging world of caregiving. Bye for now.