Home >Magazine >How I Learned to Take Care of Myself As Well As I Take Care of Others

How I Learned to Take Care of Myself As Well As I Take Care of Others

After decades as an attentive wife and mother, it took falling down stairs and almost cracking her head open for Lorraine Duffy Merkl to start setting boundaries.

“I’m shocked you’re still alive.”

That was the reaction of Neil, my husband of 33 years, as I described via phone from a New York City ER my fall down a flight of cement steps.

Except, I was at the hospital not for my own potential injuries, but for my 99-year-old mother, Angelina.

At around 3:30 a.m. that morning, she called out to me from her room in our 4th-floor apartment where she’d lived for about two years. My family, which also consists of my 27-year-old son Luke and 24-year-old daughter Meg, was no stranger to accompanying my mother to the emergency room, but this was the first time in the wee hours.

Since Neil had to get up for work in a few hours, I told him to go back to sleep. I knew the drill and could handle things on my own. Everything was business as usual until the EMTs put Angelina in the building’s elevator and insisted there was no room for me.  I thought, Why argue? and decided to take the stairs.

Read More: Doing Too Much for Too Many for Too Long? It Stops Right Here

The Fall 

Whether it was my pre-coffee stupor or rush to meet them down on the street, I tripped over my own feet, causing this triathlete to tumble-slide-roll down the steps until I face planted on the 3rd-floor landing.

I was upset because once again I placed the needs of others before my own.

I wanted to just lie there and cry. True to form though, I hopped up and made it Job Number One to get downstairs to ride along in the ambulance with my mother.

Shaken more than anything, I felt fine until we reached the ER. After getting my mother checked in, I started to feel as though someone had beaten me up. Neil volunteered to work from home after my mother was released so he could stay with her while I went to get X-rays. Thankfully, nothing appeared to be broken but I was referred to the ER for a CT scan. Here I was back at the emergency room, and this time I had to wait seven hours to be seen. Fortunately, the results showed no brain injury or bleeding, but still my head and body had experienced a violent shaking.

I was thankful that the news wasn’t worse, and at the same time, fit to be tied. I didn’t even know who I was mad at, then I realized it was myself.

I proceeded to play the shoulda-coulda-woulda game: I should have called Neil from the stairwell; I could have had him come down to the ER and pick up Angelina and checked in as a patient right there; I would have squeezed into the elevator with EMTs relaying that I did this often enough that I know the elevator can hold the gurney as well as three people.

Who’s First Now? 

More than any of that though, I was upset because once again I placed the needs of others before my own. I had always done it with my children when I prided myself on making it on time to back-to-back activities even if the tight, anxiety-promoting scheduling threw me into panic attacks. I’d done it with my husband, by loading my plate so he could have more “me-time” because he had the job that supported our family so I could be a SAHM/freelancer. Now I was doing it with my mother too, by being at her beck-n-call to pay her back for taking care of me as a single mom, then helping me take care of Luke and Meg so they’d have their granny as their nanny.

I vowed that after six decades, this dog was going to learn a new trick: self-care.

Somewhere along the line, I got it into my head that that’s what a good mother/wife/daughter did—and now I had a concussion, black and blue splotches all over my body, and impaired balance as a reward.

That evening as I cried the stress out of myself, I vowed that after six decades, this dog was going to learn a new trick: self-care. In fact, I made the word my mantra.

I’ve known many a bad habit in my lifetime, but never have I broken one so quickly. Having the $&%! scared out of me by the tumble was a great motivator.

Now, within the parameters of caring for others, I take myself into account without guilt.

My New Mantra

Self-care” is what I whisper when I’m about to carry more than I can handle so I only have to make one trip; I now make two, or enlist help. It’s what I say when I feel ready to take off like Flo-Jo, as though running errands literally requires one to sprint as though there’s a finish line and medal to be had at the end of it. It’s also what I remind myself to do as I feel my engines revving because someone needs something NOW. If they want it from me, they may have to wait a minute. They’ll live. Because next time I fall, I might not.

For years, those I love have benefitted from my diligent care. I finally relieved I’m one of them.

Read More: How to Let Go of Mothering Others and Start Setting Healthy Boundaries at Midlife

***

Lorraine Duffy Merkl is the author of the upcoming novel, THE LAST SINGLE WOMAN IN NEW YORK CITY, to be published in 2022 by Heliotrope Books.

By Lorraine Duffy Merkl

0 Comments

Submit a Comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Related Articles

Find your tribe

Connect and join a community of women over 45 who are dedicated to traveling and exploring the world.

Pin It on Pinterest

Share This