I am delighted to share another beautiful submission to our Monk in the World guest series from the community. Read on for Rochelle Rawson Naylor’s reflection on the spiritual practice of being in the present moment while caring for a loved one with dementia.
Be where you are. This has been my everyday mantra for myself over the decades of my adult life. It is what I write inside the cover of my calendar in each new year, and it is below my name on my social media profile pages, so I hold it personally and share it publicly.
In earlier seasons of life, this reminded me to not be in a hurry for the “next thing” – the better job, the bigger home, the marriage, parenthood, etc. Sometimes it is about savoring the present moment – the sunset, the croissant, the fresh air, the conversation with a dear friend or loved one. In times of uncertainty, it leads me once again to this passage from Rilke’s Letters to a Young Poet:
Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart
And try to love the questions themselves.
Do not seek the answers that cannot be given you
Because you would not be able to live them,
And the point is to live everything
Live the questions now.
Perhaps you will gradually, without noticing it,
Live along some distant day
Into the answer.
Living the question steadies and grounds me to be fully present in the moment. It reminds me to breathe, to pause and pay attention to how I’m feeling, to see what in this moment I can be grateful for, to not spiral downward in worry for what the future may bring.
Be where you are. For so long, this has been about being where I am, but I now find myself needing to reflect on what it means for me in this present season of life alongside my husband as his caregiver. As his dementia progresses, his sense of time becomes more fluid, and his “memory loop” is sometimes only a few minutes long in his continuous “now.” Sometimes that “now” is a long-ago time recalled once again. Sometimes he is within a dense fog of confusion uncertain about time or day or month or who I am. Sometimes he is in the present moment but stuck on repeating the same thought or question. Sometimes he has imagined an event or conversation that is completely real to him but is not real. But sometimes he is clearly in current reality and for a time able to engage in the flow of a conversation, and every once in a while, he says or does something that reminds me of the person he used to be, a gift for which I am grateful.
With the progression of his dementia, most of my husband’s long-time close friends have drifted away, and many of the activities that gave meaning and structure to his life have become too difficult or no longer hold his interest. Hours spent in treasured pursuits have now become minutes that lead to frustration and deep sadness.
This caregiver journey itself is always in a fog – always unpredictability of what the next moment – the next hour – the next day may bring. It is even more essential now for me to pay attention to being where I am – to pause and really be fully present in the moment – to make space to feel what I am feeling – to renew my strength and patience – to keep on keeping on. But in this present season, there are also times where I need to shift my focus to try to be with my husband in the place he is in that moment – wherever that happens to be. These are the times when I must put aside “where I am” to “be where he is.”
Being where he is means having patience to respond neutrally or positively to the same story yet again or a repeated statement or question while keeping a calm tone of voice. It means trying to listen for what may be behind a far-fetched imagining and either rolling with that version of reality or gently redirecting away. It means saying how sorry I am when one of his friends doesn’t answer his phone call or respond to his text. It means saying that it is okay to not keep trying to do the things that used to be so important and now feel meaningless to him. It means me doing all these things over and over every day, and sometimes annoyance creeps into my voice, unhelpful words come out of my mouth, or my patience runs dry. Then I realize I need to step away from being in his “now” for a time.
So, each day I seek balance between being where I am and where he is. At the end of a day when I fell short as caregiver, I know that my husband has already forgotten my failure, so I try to put it aside as well. At the end of a day when I know that I was present with him as needed and also found room for myself, that is a gift of grace. And tomorrow I begin again.
Rochelle Rawson Naylor is a person of faith who grew up in Protestant traditions and is currently a member of a local congregation. In addition to being a caregiver, she works as a senior program officer at a community foundation in the community where she grew up in Iowa.
