Rayna Neises: . Hi, I am Rayna Neises, your host of A Season of Caring Podcast, where we share stories of hope for family caregivers pushing through the busyness and loneliness of caregiving to see God. even in this season. I’m excited to welcome, Catherine Fitzhugh, you with us today. Catherine is a former educator, caregiver, and passionate advocate for thoughtful planning with aging loved ones. Inspired by her own journey, supporting her parents through the challenges of aging. She wrote Walk With Me, to provide practical guidance, stories and faith-filled encouragement. Her writing combines compassion, wisdom, and biblical insight making complex caregiving decisions feel approachable, purposeful, and deeply [00:01:00] human. Welcome, Catherine. I’m so glad to have you here today.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Thank you, Rayna.

Rayna Neises: So tell us a little bit about your parents and what caregiving looked like for them.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Yes. Well, my caregiving journey, I would say was in, a multitude of layers. It started when I was a child. Because my mother was ill and, I was in a pastor’s home. He was a pastor. My dad had a church in a Christian school, and my mom was a musician and, an educator, but she was ill a lot. And, I saw it from the angle of my dad caring for her.

We were in the hospitals a lot , that was familiar. And, and then, you know, then after that, my dad took over. I moved away and when they retired, my dad had taken care of her. But when they retired, I saw a different level for her and the dementia started and she had other, health problems come along and my dad was getting older I made myself more [00:02:00] available at that time. So I lived in Pennsylvania, they lived in Florida. So, you know, one of the challenges -was how do you assist somebody that is the main caregiver? And so I just made myself available to come down, you know, maybe once a month for a few days and, help them get medications together and that kind of thing.

And then about, when my dad turned 80. My mom’s health had gotten really a lot worse. She had at, by that time, she had had a disease that took all of her, the movements of one of her right arm away and she didn’t have use of her hand or right hand. She was a right-handed person and she didn’t have use of her arm.

It hum hung limp, you know. And then on top of that, she ended up with a colostomy.

Rayna Neises: Mm.

Catherine Fitzhugh: A bag and then she had dementia. Now you put all those three things together and you know, there’s problems.

Rayna Neises: Mm-hmm.

Catherine Fitzhugh: so my dad, you know, he started getting some home healthcare.

Rayna Neises: Mm-hmm.

Catherine Fitzhugh: And so I would go down and [00:03:00] make sure that they were doing what they needed to do, take the temperature of the place and see how everything was running and make sure that, the medications were right. And I started going to doctor’s appointments

Rayna Neises: Mm-hmm.

Catherine Fitzhugh: talking to doctors and physicians and, and kind of got into the weeds with it. And then, um, when my dad turned 80. He was diagnosed with Huntington’s disease at age 80. And so this was the final level, you know? And so we knew, I know people are saying, well, you know, that’s hereditary, right?

Yes, I do. If I have a 50 50 chance of getting it too. But usually, Huntington’s occurs in your forties. And my grandmother, got it in her forties and it’s, large arm movements, you know, and unsteadiness and then, just fogginess and then it turns into kind of a dementia Alzheimer’s.

Rayna Neises: Mm-hmm.

Catherine Fitzhugh: And some people’s, personality changed. So for my grandmother, I watched her go through all of that for years, and [00:04:00] usually from the time of diagnosis to the time that you, pass away, it’s usually 12 to 15 years. So it’s a long, you know, kind of, it kind of has. You feel like it’s a cross between Parkinson’s and a LS with the movements and with the, digression.

So, when that happened, then I looked at my dad and said. Wow. Now, he can’t, you know, he can’t function with her. He can’t take care of himself. And then her, he was, you know, he’s always type A, always, walked fast, moved fast, high energy, very communicative, person. And then I just saw him start starting to go downhill.

So my caregiving started with childhood, you know, and, and taking, kind of watching the caregiving process there, getting familiar with hospitals. And then now each level, both of my parents moved in with me at one time, after his diagnosis. And then my mom, died seven years after they lived with us, and then my [00:05:00] dad five years after that.

So I had a long stint with them. It was one level to the next level. To the next level. And caregiving far away and caregiving, closeup,

Rayna Neises: I was gonna mention that I think one of the things that can feel so difficult for caregivers is that long distance,

Catherine Fitzhugh: Mm-hmm.

Rayna Neises: your eyes aren’t on them. The responsibility isn’t always right there, but the worry often can be.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Mm-hmm.

Rayna Neises: I appreciate what you said is that you did what you could as far as going down and doing the things to support, and that’s what I always feel like is important when we’re looking at family dynamics of siblings that aren’t close by and you are the one,

Catherine Fitzhugh: Yeah,

Rayna Neises: either

Catherine Fitzhugh: yeah,

Rayna Neises: is, you know, be involved, find a

Catherine Fitzhugh: yeah.

Rayna Neises: involved, do what you can

Catherine Fitzhugh: Mm-hmm.

Rayna Neises: time because. You’re going to enjoy that time.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Mm-hmm.

Rayna Neises: Those visits that you had, you got to spend time with them that you wouldn’t have

Catherine Fitzhugh: Exactly.

Rayna Neises: checking up on them.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Right,

Rayna Neises: things are going well. So I love that. That [00:06:00] was a piece of it. Definitely that progression is typical. We know they get worse, but to get that curve ball in there with the Huntington’s on top of everything else,

Catherine Fitzhugh: right.

Rayna Neises: it’s really difficult.

How did you feel like they handled the transition of moving in with you? Was that easy for you all or was there challenges of just even them to do that?

Catherine Fitzhugh: R Right. And, you know, when you go from one set of circumstances where you’re the long distance person, but you’re intimately involved in the day to day to where they live with you, you have to have the transition part not only is it the transition of just,

your role and their role, but it’s the transition. You have the financial thing and you have to learn that. And then it’s the, taking away the keys, so there was a transition that started even before they moved in with me, so that, we had an understanding ’cause he had watched his mom pass away.

He knew what was coming. The. Process of [00:07:00] getting the bad news. Was a hard one. I had never gone through that. He has two brothers that live nearby. When they were in Jacksonville they called, and said, uhoh, his feet are moving, his hands are moving.

This is looking not good. None of the kids have gotten it. My grandmother’s brothers had twin brothers, and they both had it really badly. All of their everybody down, they all got it. There was five kids, but two kids passed away when they were young in my grandmother’s children.

And, so we thought everybody’s way past the forties.

Rayna Neises: Right.

Catherine Fitzhugh: He was 80, so we thought we were home ba you know, but 80 years old and he started it and he knew, and we knew what, what we were gonna face. So that transition, was layered, but moving in with us, it was time my husband went down and said, we’re gonna have a talk, and both of ’em were like, yes, yes we will.

And so they left the, they had moved back at retirement to their [00:08:00] home church in Jacksonville where they grew up, and his two brothers and all my cousins lived there. And so, family, church, everything they walked away from to come to a place they had never seen.

Rayna Neises: Wow.

Catherine Fitzhugh: You know, I always say, help me help you.

Rayna Neises: Mm-hmm.

Catherine Fitzhugh: They have to sacrifice. If I have to sacrifice by caring for them, they have to sacrifice for by making it as easy as possible. And so,

Rayna Neises: that we need to highlight.

Catherine Fitzhugh: that was, help me help you.

Rayna Neises: saying that,

Catherine Fitzhugh: And we had that conversation and they were relatively easy to reason with, at that point,

Rayna Neises: Yes.

Catherine Fitzhugh: point, you know, we had those conversations. They were more than welcome. So, I sold their house. I sold our house, and we found a house within six weeks, we made that.

Rayna Neises: Wow.

Catherine Fitzhugh: It was a god thing right there.

And so I brought all of their, bedspreads, towels, everything that would feel some familiar and put it in the house. And when they walked in, they were like, [00:09:00] you did this for us. You know,

Rayna Neises: Yeah.

Catherine Fitzhugh: was really, really sweet. The transition of care and learning, you know, that it was always a learning curve because as you just said, every level we’d go, okay, we got the medication right, we’ve got the doctors in place, and now we’re all set for a ways, and then all of a sudden they’d get a little worse and we’d go, oh dear, now we have to.

Adjust everything that we’re doing at home and the kind of care we have. And so it made me start thinking one step ahead. Okay. What would come next? What would come next? And so yeah, that’s the end.

Rayna Neises: It’s a constant. I think that’s one of the things that can be so hard is that you feel like, oh, finally I can take a deep breath and we’ve got things settled

Catherine Fitzhugh: Yeah.

Rayna Neises: Then something changes. So that’s kind of life in all areas, but I think magnified in

Catherine Fitzhugh: Right,

Rayna Neises: caregiving for two

Catherine Fitzhugh: right,

Rayna Neises: they had such different needs

Catherine Fitzhugh: right,

Rayna Neises: times.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Right,

Rayna Neises: [00:10:00] challenging.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Right.

Rayna Neises: What would you say was most surprising to you about caregiving?

Catherine Fitzhugh: Because of the two different levels. We had one level when they were, on their own, and I wanted them to stay in their house for every moment that they could stay.

Rayna Neises: Yeah.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Even when they lived with us, I wanted them to stay independent with everything that they could possibly do, just as long as they can do it before I would step in, that kept them independent.

It was better for me and better for them. It kind of made them, function better. And so the good thing about when they lived in Jacksonville, his two brothers lived nearby and all their kids. So I had lots of cousins there. And so I remember going down one time and thinking, how am I gonna manage this because.

My mom was progressively getting worse, and it was very hard. So we had people come in a few hours every day just to get things settled. And, I looked at my cousins one day and my uncles and aunts and said, if there’s anything [00:11:00] you can do, if there’s any role that you would like to play in this grand scheme of things, no guilt and no pressure, but feel free.

To do whatever you can. And then I thought I, I’m just gonna ask, I’m gonna say, and that was hard. That was hard. I’m gonna say, I would really appreciate if some of, if you would just take ’em out to Cracker Barrel. Once in a while, you know, if you’d come in and, and just say, can I do a load of laundry?

Even though we had people come in, there was things that they could do. Can you bring a meal over? Could you take them out, in the car for a ride? Can you, and so can you take ’em to a doctor’s appointment? And so. I, you know, his one brother lived a few blocks away and, he came over almost every day.

He had his own key, walked in the front door, went over to the cookie jar, got a cookie out, walked over to my mom, kissed her on the forehead, sat down in the recliner, and they all just sat and talked for hours. And I was like, this is it. That’s his role, that’s a big role. And [00:12:00] he would take dad grocery shopping and all those kind of things.

My other uncle, he and his kids would show up around Thanksgiving time and get all of their Christmas stuff out of the shed and inside and out, put all their Christmas stuff, and then after Christmas, take it all down. And that was their shtick,

Rayna Neises: Yeah.

Catherine Fitzhugh: And then the cousins also, would call. That was very meaningful and they would call me and say, how is there anything we can do? And that was a God thing. God showed up with my family. God showed up with that.

Rayna Neises: Having the ability to just be that honest and just ask, and I.

Catherine Fitzhugh: it was hard.

Rayna Neises: I wanna encourage, I’m glad you just said that, because I think other people that, oh, I could never do that. Or You don’t know my family, no one would wanna help. But

Catherine Fitzhugh: It.

Rayna Neises: that you ask, and again, I often say, let’s change, change it from asking to inviting.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Right.

Rayna Neises: If

Catherine Fitzhugh: Yes.

Rayna Neises: invite

Catherine Fitzhugh: your role.

Rayna Neises: then we can’t say they won’t do anything.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Right,

Rayna Neises: we’ve invited them before and they’ve said no,

Catherine Fitzhugh: right,[00:13:00]

Rayna Neises: don’t

Catherine Fitzhugh: right.

Rayna Neises: Don’t have expectations, because then you set yourself up for disappointment and so many times, again, sibling family members, we hear it all the time. No one does anything Well.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Right,

Rayna Neises: time you invited them to do something specific

Catherine Fitzhugh: right,

Rayna Neises: and,

Catherine Fitzhugh: right.

Rayna Neises: What would you like to do?

Catherine Fitzhugh: Yes.

Rayna Neises: What are you interested in??

Catherine Fitzhugh: Right,

Rayna Neises: it’s very uncomfortable for some people to do some parts of it.

Catherine Fitzhugh: right.

Rayna Neises: as a family caregiver, we don’t really get to pick and choose ’cause they need it. And so we need to do it, but.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Right.

Rayna Neises: If there’s someone who’s going to not be involved at all, or just be the one who comes and has a cookie and visits,

Catherine Fitzhugh: Right.

Rayna Neises: You

Catherine Fitzhugh: Yeah.

Rayna Neises: visit.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Yes.

Rayna Neises: in whatever way they can.

Catherine Fitzhugh: and also they were able to report like, we see some things that maybe you ought to be, and I invited them to please call. If you see anything or have any concern, please call me. And to your point that you’re just saying, a lot of times in that group of people, some people did nothing,

Rayna Neises: Mm-hmm.[00:14:00]

Catherine Fitzhugh: But I looked at ’em and said, well, they have a lot on their plate, and it was true, some people didn’t have a lot on their plate and they still didn’t do anything, but people are only capable of doing what they’re capable of.

Rayna Neises: Yes.

Catherine Fitzhugh: And I wanted to give them that benefit of the doubt. I said I learned that I threw away the scale.

Rayna Neises: Mm-hmm.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Of who does the most and who gives the most.

Rayna Neises: It doesn’t

Catherine Fitzhugh: And

Rayna Neises: benefit

Catherine Fitzhugh: it

Rayna Neises: in

Catherine Fitzhugh: had to

Rayna Neises: To keep score,

Catherine Fitzhugh: That’s right. You had to throw that scale away. That way there’s no, no regrets.

Rayna Neises: Yes.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Yeah.

Rayna Neises: Yeah. It’s so important because we’re not, it’s not gonna change anything.

Catherine Fitzhugh: No, no.

Rayna Neises: Saying I did the most, doesn’t make it any better.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Right,

Rayna Neises: And you

Catherine Fitzhugh: right.

Rayna Neises: Doesn’t improve the situation.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Right.

Rayna Neises: We have to stop comparing.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Yeah.

Rayna Neises: expecting

Catherine Fitzhugh: Right.

Rayna Neises: Be thankful for what we have

Catherine Fitzhugh: Mm-hmm.

Rayna Neises: we got what we

Catherine Fitzhugh: Right.

Rayna Neises: so it’ll be all

Catherine Fitzhugh: And, and through, through, also through all this I share [00:15:00] this a little in my book, but it’s sensitive. But my brother was a no-show

Rayna Neises: Mm-hmm.

Catherine Fitzhugh: at all, and you know, he struggled with the life. And so in a way I was glad, I was kind of glad, okay, we don’t have to deal with his trauma drama, you know?

But yet my mom cried every day for him, it’s easy to say I’m not gonna have, bitterness or I’m not going to be angry at him. And, and I had to pick up that. And put it down, pick that up and put it, put it down, give it to the Lord. You know, several times. But then one day I thought, you know what?

I’m the one that gets to spend this time with them. I have them. And that’s far more important than anything. I didn’t need him to do anything, but just be there for me. Maybe just to say, how are you? You know, be my brother, but he missed all that.

Rayna Neises: Mm-hmm.

Catherine Fitzhugh: uh, in all that then, you know, God knew and I got to put [00:16:00] away the scale for them, for him, but anyway.

Rayna Neises: Such a beautiful point and so important and not easy to do.

Catherine Fitzhugh: No. Right.

Rayna Neises: And it is a process of choosing of will, just like any forgiving, any time.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Right,

Rayna Neises: because we feel like it, it’s because.

Catherine Fitzhugh: right.

Rayna Neises: We are told, we’re commanded to, and it’s a process. Each time we feel those feelings of resentment or frustration or whatever, it’s the, okay, Lord, help me forgive again.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Right, right, right.

Rayna Neises: and he is faithful to do that.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Yes.

Rayna Neises: So share with us a time that really stands out, when God showed up for you.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Yes. The caregivers that came into our life, were, I just said only God could do this.

Rayna Neises: Mm.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Only God can bring this person in into our world right now. And, that happened, my mom, had someone that came into our world that was a retired. [00:17:00] Lady, and she was older.

She was not much, not a whole lot younger than my mother, but she just understood her. And, and I learned to hire because when you have, when you bring people in, sometimes you go, Ooh, no, this is, this is, they don’t get it, you know, or they’re here to do work, you know? And I needed somebody to come in and connect.

And so I learned to hire for fit.

Rayna Neises: Yes.

Catherine Fitzhugh: for ability.

Rayna Neises: Yes.

Catherine Fitzhugh: so when this older lady came in, I thought, Hmm, that’s, that’s, this is unusual. Okay. So she and my mom just hit it off. My mom had dementia, but she got into my mom’s world. My mom was particular about her necklace and about her hair and about, you know, putting makeup on.

And they just, she just got into her world and, and my mom followed her around and she let my mom do things with her and it was just this [00:18:00] perfect, harmonious fit for her life. And it is just like a companion for my mother.

Rayna Neises: Yeah.

Catherine Fitzhugh: it wasn’t somebody to come in and take a load off of me. It was a somebody for her and I wouldn’t.

It, it was, and I would not have even imagined that. But all of a sudden here was Maryanne standing there and she was just God’s gift. And then after my mom went to heaven. We moved and we needed somebody for my dad and somebody from Clayton’s, office said, you know, my wife just passed away and she was with my wife for five years.

She’s wonderful, and she walked into her life and she was perfect for my father. Just my, my father could do everything for himself. He was a little off kilter with, his balance. So he used a walker, but she just, spent time with him. They sat and worked on the computer together. ’cause he was, he couldn’t do it [00:19:00] anymore, but he wanted to and she worked with him with that.

He had Facebook friends and, and then, and you know, just, she made sure he was dressed like just as neatly as he wanted to be.

Rayna Neises: Mm-hmm.

Catherine Fitzhugh: And you know, one day I came in, I had left and they were having lunch, and I came back a couple hours later, they were still sitting at the table and Paula hops up and she goes, oh, we’re still sitting at the table.

I’m sorry. I didn’t get anything done. And I said, Paula, I don’t care if any of that gets done. If you sat here all day with my dad and you guys talked about his life and you talked about things and he was, he talked slow and he got confused sometimes, but she just let him just talk and she asked him questions.

She knew what questions death, and it was just, it was another God thing. God just showed up and brought the right person for both of them and, and I would say it was for me, but it wasn’t for me. God did it for them,

Rayna Neises: Mm-hmm.

Catherine Fitzhugh: know? Yeah. God did it for them. In fact, Paula was good for me because one day. [00:20:00] I snuck out of the house, you know, instead of going in and saying goodbye, I snuck outta the house, because a lot of times he’d go, I wanna go, I wanna go.

And then we’d get out a little ways, and it was really hard for him,

Rayna Neises: much.

Catherine Fitzhugh: and he’d go, I need to go back home, you know? So I thought, I’m just gonna sneak out. Well, I got back home and Paula said, okay, don’t do that again.

Rayna Neises: Mm.

Catherine Fitzhugh: You know, she looked at me and she said, no, no, no. You have to come in and say goodbye to him because I think you hurt his feelings.

So I thought, okay, this is good. Yeah. God brought the right people.

Rayna Neises: I love that. And that’s such an important point and we experienced it as well. We had bad hires, but we had some people that were just a gift.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Yeah.

Rayna Neises: I wanna encourage you, caregivers, if you are looking for help, pray them in.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Yes,

Rayna Neises: they need you, your family, and your loved one just like you need them.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Yeah.

Rayna Neises: And I agree. There are some that I look back on and they were just what he needed. And I always tell caregivers too, [00:21:00] we aren’t all they need.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Right, right. No.

Rayna Neises: do it all ourselves

Catherine Fitzhugh: Right,

Rayna Neises: best for us to do it.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Right,

Rayna Neises: I was the same boy.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Right.

Rayna Neises: I know what needs to be done, but the relationships he had with some of the other people met a need in him

Catherine Fitzhugh: Yeah, absolutely.

Rayna Neises: before, my dad had a male caregiver that was the goofiest guy I’ve ever met, and I would say he would come in. was there for three days straight, but I would, I would go downstairs and when the caregiver came early in the morning, I would sleep and it would be my time. I didn’t have to worry about if my dad was up and about or what was happening.

And so I would really sleep and then I would get up about three hours later and go upstairs and relieve the caregiver. And might go upstairs and like every cabinet door would be open. You know what I

Catherine Fitzhugh: Yeah.

Rayna Neises: the milk’s still sitting on the table, and who knew how long it had been there because the guy was not a great caregiver, but they were such great friends.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Right. That’s it. That’s [00:22:00] it?

Rayna Neises: much joy

Catherine Fitzhugh: Yeah.

Rayna Neises: Could be goofy with Al when I wasn’t the

Catherine Fitzhugh: Yes. Yeah. Yeah.

Rayna Neises: met those needs for him. And like you said, it wasn’t necessarily meeting my needs, it was the boxes weren’t checked, but.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Right?

Rayna Neises: Many things were in place. And so I just wanna encourage you, caregivers, if you’re trying to find support, you’re trying to find those people that come into your home, pray them in,

Catherine Fitzhugh: Yeah.

Rayna Neises: and look, be open.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Mm-hmm.

Rayna Neises: they can bring to your

Catherine Fitzhugh: Mm-hmm.

Rayna Neises: an expectation

Catherine Fitzhugh: Right,

Rayna Neises: be a certain thing.

Catherine Fitzhugh: right.

Rayna Neises: so.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Right.

Rayna Neises: Well, Catherine, you, I’m just enjoying it so much. All that you’re sharing with us. Tell us, what would be one thing that you do to live content? Love well, and care without regrets each day.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Well, in, in, you know, I, I think when I look back on all of it, I think the fact that I planned, a little bit and my dad was instrumental in that when [00:23:00] I’d go visit him, he would bring me in his office and say, Hey, I want you to sit down and I wanna show you this, this, and this. And I just didn’t take it.

I just, you know, all right. You know? And then he started saying, I want you to see how Medicare works, you know? And I discovered it wasn’t free. And then, and then, and then I know. And then, um, and then he’d say, I want you to file these papers. Well. Alright. And I’d file the papers but I knew what he was doing.

I figured it out. Duh. He was, I was learning his filing system and I was learning what was in there. And so that served me well because, as he started declining, I would’ve never known

Rayna Neises: Right.

Catherine Fitzhugh: because my inbox, things that he saved for me got thicker and thicker and all of a sudden I said, why didn’t you do this?

Well, I didn’t know what that meant.

Rayna Neises: Mm-hmm.

Catherine Fitzhugh: You know, so that was planning, well,

Rayna Neises: Yeah.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Makes the caregiving process, easier, more transition is [00:24:00] better. And so the planning well, and then the living well, I think that part of. You think about, okay, I don’t wanna think about this time of life because it’s about aging and dying and sickness and all that.

Well, yes it is, but also it’s about living,

Rayna Neises: Mm-hmm.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Because dying is one moment. In this whole thing, one moment is dying. You might be getting worse, but there’s only one moment of dying. The rest of it is living even the last few days even.

Rayna Neises: Yep.

Catherine Fitzhugh: And, and, and by the way, hospice is wonderful. It’s a blessing.

Hospices, don’t be afraid of it. Living well and finding something every day to say, this is what we’re gonna do special today, and make them look forward to something the next day and something the next day. Just making sure you do the planning well, the living well, and the caring well, bringing people into their life that brings meaning to them.

Watching and learning about the medication, and learning [00:25:00] about connecting with the caregivers in a way that they help you. And then, and then the other thing is. You have to take time and say. What am I gonna do for me in all this? How am I going to, how am I gonna survive this myself? And so I, I love the verse.

It’s John 10 27. My sheep hear my voice. I know them. They follow me. I, I just love that verse. And that’s, those are the, that’s what I did every day. My sheep hear my voice. I would sit and try to hear the voice of the Lord. Hear, hear God, know God. Hear him, my sheep hear my voice.

I know them. And to think that he knows me, that’s, that was sobering and that was comforting when I was in the middle of it and thinking God knows me, you know? So I hear him, I know him, and then I follow him. And that’s how I got through my, you know, God, what would you have me to do today with this? You know, because when you have two parents, [00:26:00] one with dementia and one that’s, declining quickly and it feels like a zoo some days, it feels outta control, you know?

And then I’ll tell you some of the one funny thing. So my mom loved cats, right? So she brought her cat to live with us, which my husband does not like cats at all. So she brought the cat. So it, she always thought that the cat needed to be covered up at night.

Rayna Neises: Hmm.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Have you ever tried to get a cat to cover up at night? No.

Rayna Neises: It doesn’t like it’s

Catherine Fitzhugh: So at two o’clock in the morning. Mom decided, she wanted to get up and we were looking for the cat at two in the morning to get the cat to cover the cat up. That’s my funny mama story that I think of, and we got lots of laughs over that.

But you know when it’s two o’clock in the morning and, I had a doorbell. That she could ring for. And it rang, it chimed outside my bedroom. I knew that, okay, God, this is, I’m tired, but this is what I’m supposed to [00:27:00] do, you know, and I’m gonna follow you and I’m gonna, I’m going to wake up and I’m gonna be, what I need to be for her.

Even at two o’clock in the middle of the night looking for a cat, you know? So.

Rayna Neises: That doesn’t anything. It totally fine where it is.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Yes, just staying connected with the Lord and all that, you know, and then just responding instead of reacting to things, you know, God just kept me content and leveled on that.

Rayna Neises: Yeah, that’s some great wisdom. All right, speaking of window wisdom, let’s, hit some ideas here. Things that you would like to tell people who are just starting out or in the thick of their caregiving right now.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Say that again, you’re cutting out a little bit.

Rayna Neises: share with people that are in the thick of their caregiving or are, just starting out.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Yeah. So, I have a list of things that can I, you wanna do a rapid fire?

Rayna Neises: Sure, go for it.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Okay. And you jump in too as I list some of these. One is, understanding that there’s gonna be the level of care. The [00:28:00] level of care, like I said before, that’s right now, will, in a month, it’ll be different and in six months it’ll be very different.

So you’d be thinking one, level ahead about, okay, what’s coming next? ’cause it will come and as the health decline, talk to your doctor and read and try to figure out what’s gonna be my next step. Then transitioning the finances, you know, try to get in there a little early.

The earlier you can, the better. And the other thing, when my dad came to live with me, he would always say, well, do we need to go to the bank? And I’d say, well, sure. You know, and so he’d get his little card. It made him feel good to go to the bank. So I left money in his account and we’d go up to the teller and get some money out, so he always felt like there’s money there.

And he’d say, do I have money? And I’d say, you know how you had your bill paid? I’m still paying your bills. Just like you set ’em up and he’d go, okay. So there’s things like that that you kind of do. Give them dignity, you know, and let them know that they’re, that it’s still there, [00:29:00] but they’re solvent

and, you know, transitioning to those finances before they get to the place where they can’t tell you what, what’s going on where, where you don’t know where anything is, and you’re trying to figure it out on the fly. So earlier is better. And then with dementia, here’s, you know, dementia. The best thing you can do is to get into their world.

Rayna Neises: Mm-hmm.

Catherine Fitzhugh: When they say something, if it’s the wrong date or the wrong person or the wrong thing, you just get into their world. You don’t correct them. And even if they, call you by, their last girlfriend’s name, or their last boyfriend’s name. And I saw this a lot when we were in memory care with my dad, that, you know, the husbands would get very offended or the wives would get very offended if their spouse called them somebody else’s name.

And you know, one day I looked at the lady and I said, look, you know, he knows you, you know it’s you that he’s talking to. He’s got the name wrong, but you’re the one that’s familiar to him. So, don’t [00:30:00] get offended by the name because it’s you that he recognizes and he knows you belong to him.

He might not know who you are exactly, but he knows you belong to him. And then the other thing is medication. So I learned with medication. Whatever was on the list, and I kept a list of all the medication. I would learn what each medication was and what the side effect was so that I could recognize what to do.

And whenever we’d go to the doctor and he’d say, okay, I have a new medication for you. In fact, I have two new medications we’re gonna add. You know, and I always said, less is more. But

Rayna Neises: Yeah.

Catherine Fitzhugh: he was gonna add two, I would say, first off, can we start off with just one? This the next few days, unless it was like a chronic cold or something we needed to address.

But can I start with just one and we’ll start taking a half of the first one and then if it no bad si side effects, we’ll take the hole and then we’ll add the second one in, you know, in a few more days and take a half of it. And I did that, you know. And it really paid [00:31:00] off because sometimes it was, they would take two new medications and side effects would be, you know what I’m talking about, side effects would be crazy and we wouldn’t know which one it was or why.

So I had that habit and the doctor kind of knew that I was gonna ask that question. And also, if something makes ’em sleepy, can they take the sleep, that medication at night?

Rayna Neises: Yeah.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Instead of taking it in the morning. So can you, can you adjust that? So I really learned the meds. I kept less lists on my phone. I kept lists at the door and, and sorrow.

There’s, there’s no other pain like, sorrow than, and when you face that pain, you know, there’s nothing, there’s no other pain that you can relate it to and to understand that your husband or your children or your mother or dad won’t respond and won’t, won’t react and won’t take the sorrow the same way you do.

Everybody processes it different, and so many people. Lose their marriages or lose their, [00:32:00] relationships because they’re mad at somebody because they’ve gone on with life and, and they just process it different. So you have to just be, to understand about the sorrow with someone. That’s it.

Rayna Neises: Those are some great things that I think so important, a wide variety, but each of them are very important to be thinking about no matter where you are in the caregiving realm of it all. The transitions are hard. Holding them loosely expectations are one of the most difficult things when we are determined.

Something needs to look a certain way is when we get ourselves in trouble. So

Catherine Fitzhugh: Right,

Rayna Neises: you’re willing to be flexible and go with the flow.

Catherine Fitzhugh: right,

Rayna Neises: Well, thank you so much for sharing all your wisdom. It was amazing. Tell our listeners how they can find your book and stay connected with you.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Yes. I’m on Amazon. If you just put in Catherine Fitzhugh\ and, Walk With Me. It’s there.

Rayna Neises: Great. Catherine, thank you again for being our guest today. We really appreciate all the [00:33:00] wisdom that you shared with us today.

Catherine Fitzhugh: Thank you so much for having me.

Rayna Neises: And thank you for joining us for Stories of Hope with Catherine on A Season of Caring Podcast where there is hope to live content, love well, and care without regret. If you have financial, medical, or legal questions, be sure to consult your local professionals and take heart in your season of caring.

*Transcript is an actual recount of the live conversation