Episode 88: How to be Grateful When your Life Sucks

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Do you hate it when people try to tell you that you shouldn’t be so sad, angry, stressed out because things could be worse? Does it anger you when people tell you to find the silver lining in this storm of caregiving?

Learning how to be grateful can help when life gets really difficult

Gratitude should not be

•  Dismissive or used to minimize what you’re going through
•  A way for you to say things could be worse
•  A method of showing you that you have things to be grateful for and by default have nothing to complain about.

There’s nothing worse than having a moment when someone tells you that it could be worse or try to tell you things aren’t as bad as they seam. So I’m not suggesting that this is what gratitude should look like for you because that’s not helpful for you.

This episode is about 

•  Learning how to validate your struggle by naming it and seeing it
•  Not using gratitude as the solution to your problems
•  Understand how to attend to the hardships of caregiving but at the same time learn how to be grateful in a way that is supportive of your caregiving needs.

Listen to this episode and learn how gratitude can be a part of your life even when life sucks. 

Show Notes

How to be grateful when life sucks

 Do you hate it when people try to tell you that you shouldn’t be so sad, angry, stressed out because things could be worse? Does it anger you when people tell you to find the silver lining in this storm of caregiving? 

Let’s talk about how to be grateful when your life suck

Learning how to be grateful can help when life gets really difficult

You really start to notice the little things after a while. It helps you put things into perspective and aids in reducing stress. Studies show that a gratitude practice can improve a person’s physical and mental health, enhance empathy, reduce aggression, help people sleep better, and increase self-esteem. What I find most important for us is that having a gratitude practice can create resilience. It helps a person respond instead of react and supports their ability to navigate through emotions and personal hardships. 

Wait… don’t switch the episode because this isn’t an episode to tell you that you need to find happiness when things get difficult. It’s to help you find a way to be able to say this freaking sucks and still be able to notice things you are grateful for. There is space for both and quite frankly you need to hear this.

 Here is what this is not about.  

Gratitude should not be

•  Dismissive or used to minimize what you’re going through
•  A way for you to say things could be worse
•  A method of showing you that you have things to be grateful for and by default have nothing to complain about.

 This episode is about 

•  Validating your struggle by naming it and seeing it
•  Not using gratitude as the solution to your problems
•  Attending to the hardships of caregiving but at the same time learning how to be grateful in a way that is supportive of your caregiving needs.

How do you do this?

 First, you need to take a moment to name what is difficult for you right now. Oftentimes we feel like caregiving is just too much but don’t know exactly what is really overwhelming us. Naming what is really weighing you down is a great way to take away some of its power over you.

Maybe it’s:

•  Resentment that you are a caregiver
•  The worry you feel about your loved one  
•  Not feeling supported by your family and friends
•  The loneliness of caregiving
•  Feeling guilt for wanting a break

Name it. Feel it. Understand that you aren’t alone and it isn’t wrong for you to feel these things. I talk about these points often here in the podcast. If these are things that you are really struggling with browse through the other episodes and you will certainly find something that focuses on these individually. 

The important thing here is to understand what makes caregiving hard at any point in time because it will constantly change. Feel the anger, resentment, sadness, loneliness or whatever that emotion is that you’ve been hiding because you felt like you’d be judged for it or just didn’t have the energy to process it. I’ll never say that caregiving is easy. It is difficult in varying degrees for all of us and it’s never an option to compare your hardship to other caregivers. Whatever we are feeling is valid. Caregiving sucks in varying degrees until you aren’t a caregiver anymore. Think about that.

In order to find ways to put your life as a caregiver into perspective, it helps to find a moment in time to also name what you are grateful for. In the beginning, it makes it easier to remember to do this if it’s at the same time of the day. Maybe first thing in the morning or before you go to bed. 

Do NOT do this when you are upset about something or sad. This isn’t about finding a way to avoid the uncomfortableness of your life at any given moment. I’m not telling you to be dismissive of the difficulty of your life. What I’m suggesting is that in spite of how hard caregiving is for your right now you find just one moment in your day to think of one thing you are grateful for. 

Start small. If you decide to do this in the morning you can be… grateful for being alive today, to be able to see, that your loved one is in the world with you, that your house is still standing, that your water works, that you were able to pee. 

Don’t make it feel like it has to be big or profound. Just something you’re grateful for. 

There’s nothing worse than having a moment when someone tells you that it could be worse or try to tell you things aren’t as bad as they seem. My husband has thyroid cancer and most people think it’s as simple as removing a thyroid and curing the person but that is not his experience. He’ll have to live with cancer for the rest of his life and it isn’t easy to live a life with thyroid cancer. So when someone learns he has thyroid cancer and they tell me at least it's the “good kind” that is invalidating our experience because they want to show me that it could be worse. 

So I’m not suggesting that this is what gratitude should look like for you because that’s not helpful for you. There is no reason for you to find yourself in moments where you are angry that you are a caregiver today and then turn around and stuff that anger back inside because it could be worse. Caregiving is so incredibly difficult, so what I do want you to do is find just one moment to find good in your day. One minute to think of one thing you’re grateful for because these small, good moments do make a difference and you need to find a way to find that positivity, especially if the rest of your day will be stressful. 

Gratitude doesn’t cost you anything. You can do this whenever and wherever you want and it takes absolutely no time. So give it a try. Do it when you remember it. Some people will set a soft alarm to remind themselves in the beginning. Do it and see if it makes a difference after a while. You deserve these small moments in your day. 

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