"Accept Caregiving Help When You Can" by Sue Montgomery.
Summer Season of "Letters From A Caregiver"
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I’m Victoria. You can read why I’m publishing Carer Mentor here: Who Started Carer Mentor and Why? I created Carer Mentor to offer heartfelt empathy for Caregivers. It’s a hub of practical tools, resources, and insights. A community support network for all of us human-ing hard. ❤️ Start exploring here.
Letters from a Caregiver.
“Letters from a Caregiver” is a weekly article where a caregiver offers their wisdom, compassion, and hope to their younger self. No one knows us as well as we know ourselves, and even then, we may second-guess ourselves. The choices, challenges and tragedies we’ve faced have forged us in more ways than anyone can understand; in ways we’re still trying to decipher!
Since September 2025, thirty-two letters have been posted over three seasons.
This Summer Season so far
“Caregiving is a continuous evolution of my love, trust and courage.” by Victoria
“You Have to Receive in Order for the Circle of Love to be Complete” by Kaeli Hansen Caregivers Count with Kaeli
“When Wishes Come True” by Cindy Roman, who writes Alzheimer’s Witness
Today’s ‘Letter from a Caregiver’ is by Sue Montgomery, RN, BSN, MA
I met Sue earlier this year. I could tell from her writing and comments on other articles that she has a wealth of professional and personal experience, caring for others. Her warmth and empathy for others are clear in the way she shares and offers others support.
I invited Sue to join our Carer Mentor Community Network team to support the monthly discussions about Eldercare/caring for parents. Sue provided her insights as part of the June Eldercare/Caring for Parents Discussion: “The child-to-parent dynamic.”
Sue’s letter brought back memories of caring for my father - the fun moments, the bittersweet moments and the depth of love we shared even in the toughest times. Thank you, Sue.
You can read more of Sue’s at her publication: Organize the Essentials LLC. For example, you can learn more about palliative and hospice care in this article, by Sue: 3 Ways Hospice and Palliative Care Are Different. When we talk about hospice and palliative care, the two terms often exist within the same breath.
This was the first article I read by Sue: Why We Need to Change the Language of Family Caregiving. Words matter more than we may realize.
Author’s Bio: Sue Montgomery, RN, BSN, MA is a former critical care and hospice nurse, seasoned family caregiver, healthcare copywriter, and bestselling Christian fiction author. Both in her professional career as a hospice nurse and with loved ones, she’s experienced the sacred space that’s possible at the end of life. That’s why it’s a passion of hers and why her focus is on providing resources that support peaceful dying. Sue’s publication: Organize the Essentials LLC
Accept Caregiving Help When You Can
Dear younger me,
I’m writing to give you a heads-up about how things will be when Mom dies. Maybe I can help you deal with all the pain you’ll feel by better preparing you for it.
Because let me tell you, you’re going to think you’re ready, but you won’t be. Instead, you’ll feel like your foundation has been yanked out from under you, and you won’t believe that she’s actually gone.
But I’m getting ahead of myself.
By the time Mom steps into Jesus’s arms in 2015, you’ll have been taking care of her nearly 24/7 for four years. But she’ll have lived with you and Dave almost ten (She’ll reluctantly move in after she breaks each hip six months apart, and Dave invites her to live with you guys. Of course, you invited her, too, but his invite seals the deal).
She’ll enjoy a lot of independence the first six years. But in 2011, things will start going downhill. It’ll start the evening her robe catches that mug on the low shelf in the kitchen – which bounces off her lower leg and leaves a bruise.
Pay attention to that bruise.
Despite your efforts to keep it in check, her blood thinners will mean that lower leg will gradually fill with blood – resulting in a lot of pain, two surgeries, a MRSA infection, IV antibiotics, and eight months of daily dressing changes for that massive post-op wound.
But through all that and in the years after as her health declines, you’ll confirm what you knew all along: you and Mom really love each other, and you make a great team.
You’ll laugh together, cry together, be mad at each other, forgive each other, and make up lots of stories that one will start and the other will finish - just like when you were a kid. Some of the most hilarious will include Stuart, your pet rat.
Yes, you’ll have a pet rat.
He’s white and apparently belonged to someone else before Dave found him all alone in the bushes. Since Dave rescues every stray he finds, you’ll know he’s coming home with him - which is why you tell Dave right off that he has to keep him in the garage. You’ll take him to a vet to make sure he’s healthy, listen to them rave about how smart and affectionate pet rats are, and then shock everyone by bonding with him while Dave is away at a conference. Dave will build him a condo, and your sweet Boxer, Rocky, will think you’re all nuts.
But this letter isn’t about Stuart. He just reminds me of how much fun you and Mom had together, which is so important.
Fun, that is.
Because within the tedium and exhaustion you’ll often feel in the midst of being a caregiver for so many years, it’s easy to let it go.
But don’t.
Fight for fun.
Yes, these will be Mom’s final years. Yes, you’ll dread how much you’ll miss her when she’s gone. Yes, feeling rested will be a thing of the past. But don’t let all the hard stuff put a kink in your ability to have a ball together. As Mom will tell you during her steep decline in the last few weeks before her death, “Don’t be maudlin, Sue.”
For the most part, you’ll do a good job of keeping fun in the equation, because the two of you are kinda crazy together.
But here’s something important I want you to know: there will be so many times when you’ll feel like you should do everything for Mom. That since the two of you have always been a team, and you’ve always taken care of her, you shouldn’t let someone else come in at the end to help.
Namely, hospice.
Yep, can you believe it?
With all your years in hospice, you know how much easier things are when there’s help with bathing and nursing care, but you’ll think you should continue to do all that yourself. That you’re somehow letting Mom down if you don’t. That you’re the only one who knows how to do what’s best for her.
But you’re not.
In the last three weeks of her life, she’ll transition from a wonderful palliative care program into hospice. Since you’ll be really tired by then, please accept the visits from home health aides to help you with her bathing. It doesn’t mean you have to give up everything, but it’ll help both you and Mom to have that extra support. And when shift nursing is offered in her final days, accept that, too, so you can actually stretch out and get some sleep.
Because that last week of her life? It’s going to be the longest of your life. And you’ll need the support. Like you’ll tell a dear friend who comes to help, it’ll be harder than you thought it would be.
But here’s something you’ll always be grateful for: when Mom dies, you’ll be right there with her. In fact, it will be one of the most powerful experiences of your life. You, holding her hand. Her, one foot in heaven and one on earth. It’ll feel like you’re looking over her shoulder at Paradise ahead, wishing you could tag along.
Just before she dies, you’ll be nearly at your breaking point, ready to step out to breathe for a bit. But don’t. Stay. The fact that you did will be a huge comfort to you after she’s gone.
The moment she takes her last breath, in her own bed, with you by her side, you’ll fall to your knees with gratitude. Thanking Jesus that she got to live her final season the way she wanted to. And that she is finally, peacefully Home.
But the next morning, your waking thought will be, “This is the first day of my life learning to live without my mom.”
And over the days, weeks, and months to follow, the depth of your grief will surprise you. You’ll find out you weren’t nearly as ready as you thought you were.
While that will be more painful than you ever expected, it will also drive you closer to Jesus than you’ve ever been. That shift will be a turning point in deepening your intimacy with Him. Savor it.
Oh, here’s something else. Don’t enroll in that second graduate program while you’re in the midst of the other. It’s just a goofy, knee-jerk response to your grief, and you won’t finish that degree anyway.
And one more thing (I know, I keep adding stuff, but it seems like there’s so much to tell you).
In the season right after Mom’s death, you’ll be vulnerable and lost without your identity as a caregiver. Which will mean you won’t have healthy boundaries. So, work on that before you go riding in on your white horse and getting in over your head to help everyone you meet who’s in need.
Take time to heal. To learn from everything you’ve been through. Once you do, the Lord’s going to use all that – and you – to help the specific people He places in your path.
Finally, please know I’m proud of you – and Mom is, too. It’s been 11 years since she died, and I still think of her and miss her all the time.
But yellow butterflies remind me that she’s near. And I know she’ll be there waiting for me when it’s my time to come Home.
Love,
Sue
One last question to close the letter from Victoria.
Please share one quote/movie/book that’s inspired you.
I love to read all kinds of things, but the foundation of inspiration for me is the Bible. And here’s one of my favorite passages: “Yet I am always with you; you hold me by my right hand. You guide me with your counsel, and afterward you will take me into glory.” Psalm 73: 23-24
Prompt for Discussion
As a caregiver, what’s one way you’re making sure fun is part of the equation? It doesn’t have to include your loved one, maybe just something for yourself.
And if you’re so exhausted that fun seems impossible, what’s one small thing you could do to change that?
Please like ‘❤️’ the article to guide others here.
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My eyes are filled with tears as I type this. So many things you describe are eerily similar to my experience with Dad. I love how patient and kind you are with your younger self. I love how you bonded with Stuart the rat! I love how you kept the fun going between you and your dear mummy. And I love how you talk about grief. It’s very important to wait it out, to sit in it, let it run its course, and then go out and help others. I understand that instinct to get out there and be useful straight away, but that’s the worst thing we can do. We must heal before we can help.
So, thank you Sue, these words are precious and timely to me.
Such a wonderful letter. I firmly believe that fun should be part of the equation. My mom was barely aware of her surroundings in her last few weeks on earth, but she would smile and her body would calm whenever I sang to her—her last way to have fun. My mom and I sang together my whole life, and I was able to sing her into heaven.
Now, I make sure that Dad has fun, and we have fun together. Laughter has always been a big part of my family, and I see no reason for that to end. Laughing at our dogs, Daisy and Betsy, dad jokes, and watching World’s Funniest Weather are just a few of the ways we have fun. 🙂