Carers are paying the price for their compassion

If there is one thing you wouldn’t associate with an A&E department, it’s meditation.

But at a recent conference organised by the Sanctuary, the Dublin meditation centre founded by Sr Stanislaus Kennedy, we heard that full-time carer Niamh Bruce meditates during some of the hours she spends in A&E with her mother.

She was a meditator before she became a carer and meditation is a source of resilience for her as well as an important aspect of her own self-care.

The theme of the conference was that carers need to cultivate their own wellbeing even though it can be very difficult to find opportunities to do so.

The vast majority of the people at the conference were women and I wonder to what extent are men involved in caring – that is to say in unpaid, family caring.

The answer, according to a factsheet by the Care Alliance Ireland, is that about one-third of all care hours are provided by men.

But the number of male carers has been growing and rose by nearly 17 per cent between the Census of 2006 and that of 2011.

The health of family carers is good or very good though most have had the experience of being mentally or physically drained by caring, according to research. This seemed especially so when they could not get an uninterrupted night’s sleep or the person being cared for was emotionally abusive.

We human beings are often not good at being cared for. Speaker Sharon Salzberg talked about her friend Ram Dass who is known for his work on helping others. When he suffered a stroke, the toughest thing about the experience was allowing other people to care for him.

The most likely category of male carers was made up of men who had relatively little education. I wonder if these men would find it harder to fight their corner with the health system compared with men with more education.

Let’s not forget that more than 4,000 children under 15 are involved in providing care. The gender breakdown is 50/50.

I wonder why 43 per cent of carers overall are in rural areas. And why does Mayo have the highest proportion of carers with 5 per cent of people providing unpaid care? Does it reflect greater family solidarity in rural areas or is it a matter of lack of access to alternatives?

Caring is an expression of love or duty or both and, as such, reflects the better side of human nature. But carers can also pay a price in long-term stress and that is why the theme of the Sanctuary conference – self-care for carers – was so important.

Funeral oration

On a completely different topic, my attention was drawn on the Luas the other day by a young man who was reading out what appeared to be a funeral oration to his female companion.

"We are here today to celebrate the life of X," he read. "Like Michael Jackson he touched the hearts of . . ." At this point he dissolved into peals of laughter. He tried again, and again, but could never make it past the Michael Jackson reference.

It was a welcome injection of the absurd into what had been a dull day. “Oh, we are so sophisticated,” he remarked after he quietened down.

But what would happen if we all had his sense of the absurd? Would we laugh out loud at funerals? Probably, if we weren’t too close to the deceased.

I am afraid the Catholic insistence at funeral masses that we will never die strikes me as absurd when a coffin is taking centre stage. I know what they mean, but still . . .

The dead also turn out to have been living saints, caring only for their family and their faith. If anybody ever makes such a pronouncement over me, you have my prior permission to LOL.

As I got off the tram, the young man was complaining that five people had failed to like his new profile picture on Facebook. Sadly, I think he was serious.

Padraig O'Morain is accredited by the Irish Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy. His latest book is Mindfulness for Worriers. His daily mindfulness reminder is free by email.

pomorain@yahoo.com @PadraigOMorain