Therapist
JAMIE HUYSMAN, LCSW, CAP
Board Certified Diplomate for the Centers for Psychological Growth
and the Executive Director of The Leeza Gibbons Memory Foundation
March 23, 2004

 

 

As a therapist and addictions counselor, I have been fascinated how people deal with loss. Loss is the most critical trigger of positive and negative energy in our lives. Though I have worked with over 700 guest from Talk in healing ways, I learned new perspectives when working with James and 'Beyond'. The guests taught me so much. Let me tell you how......

My job in television was to assist guests of talk court and reality shows. So many shows simply used people in pain and going through loss simply for 'ratings. James and Leeza were the exceptions. Their caring and concern much longer than the cameras were rolling were a joy to work with.

On the Beyond Show, I met many people who would be considered 'caregivers'. Caregivers, of course were people who unwittingly were pulled in to another persons life by a disease state. Caregivers today are from every walk of life. They are people who take care of children with disabilities. Parents losing their memories or in need of ongoing custodial care and of course many others.

They are also people whose "out of body experience" had nothing to do with a spiritual awakening or joining the collective. Their out of body experience was literally leaving the sanctuary of their own bodies and lives to take care of another person's life. Often they would lose themselves in the other person in a way that often spoke of love, caring, victimization and martyrdom sometimes all rolled into one.

How confusing this caregiver state of mind is when you look closely. Not only does it feel like one's own life may be over. It is also watching someone who you may love's life ending as well. How powerless it feels.

So often my caregiver clients come to me medically, spiritually and psychologically challenged. Caregivers lives, when they 'leave their bodies' to jump into another persons' life, find that their lives are shortened by the experience. Of course this occurs when they stop taking care of themselves.

Leeza Gibboons and I began the Leeza Gibbons Memory Foundation, an oasis for caregivers to bring education, empowerment and education back into their often spiritually impoverished lives. Caregivers came to my practice and to James' Show as well, suffering from depression, panic, anxiety and often being medically challenged to boot. Clearly many also began picking up substances and sedatives that allowed them to either escape pre-death or post death. Escape was the operative word.

All of this is going on while at the same time, the person we may be taking care of is our Mom, Dad, Brother Sister or child. We may love them, hate them, feel indifference with them or so many other emotions....but we must continue to caregive no matter what. After all who else will? When Grief occurs, often we are too beaten up to deal with it effectively.

For years we have filled an empty hole inside of ourselves with the task of caregiving a loved one. Now they pass. What now? How do we even attempt to deal with the loss and yet spiritually nurture ourselves? Where are the practice skills? Do we care enough?

This is the pain, the challenge, the gift and hopefully the turning point of our lives. We must deal with the guilt, the shame and the aftermath. All a long we needed to tell ourselves one thing.... 'AS THE PLANE EXPERIENCES TURBULENCE AND THE OXYGEN MASK DROPS...MAKE SURE YOU TAKE THE OXYGEN FIRST AND THEN GIVE IT TO YOUR LOVED ONE!!!!

Where were those words when we needed them! We forgot to provide ourselves with oxygen. We basically allowed the caregiving to define us. Now that it is no more, we are lost. Out of oxygen.... Right? Wrong..........as our loved one joins the collective, it is so vital for us to join it too. I am sure James will tell you that any intuitive contact depends on that.

We must accept help from others... We must do something physical for our bodies, ourselves consistently..... We must join a support group.... We must get the pain out of our subconscious by being in therapy and examing our dreams and feelings.... We must pray and seek spiritual help.... We must incorporate grace and divinity into our solitude when loneliness used to rule.... We also must be a corrective emotional experience for our children.

You see our healing is contagious. If you have no children, your maternal and paternal energy needs to go on parenting the spirit of the world with grace. We must be able to talk to children about loss but more importantly show them how to take the oxygen first. Dealing with anger and resentment, guilt and shame needs to be done with others, whether it is therapy or a group, having people around you bear witness to your story reduces the trauma over time.

As a compassionate fatigue therapist, us therapists, cops, fireman and other helping professionals need the most help. As a therapist I have been in therapy for at least the past ten years. It is so critical that to be in the moment with my client I must be one with myself. Caregivers are no different.

I believe there is nothing more noble in this world than a caregiver, I have met and worked with so many. They are unsung powerful and truly deserve so much love for their effort. But I tell them that the love, comes in the form of an oxygen mask dropping from the ceiling. You must take it first and then give it to your loved one or there is no chance that both of you will make it.

Thank you for your attention and time. I am proud that one day Leeza and I will be opening up a Leeza's Place in your community. Our first opened in NY City and our second opens up next month in Melbourne, Florida. We will be on Oprah at the end of April with Maria Shriver hopefully beating the Caregiver Drum.

 

 

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Jamie is a Board Certified Licensed Clinical Social Worker and Certified Addictions Professional. His work over the past 15 years has been innovative in the field of mental health and addictions counseling.

 

As a nationally recognized Interventionist, Jamie created talk-, court- and reality-television's first program ever dedicated to helping guests on television called Aftercare�? Today Jamie assists activist and TV personality Leeza Gibbons reach out to millions of caregivers as well as those recently diagnosed with memory disorders. Their work has culminated with innovative programming soon to be available around the country through a new organization, Leeza's Place.

For more information regarding Jamie Huysman, his work and Leeza's Place organization, visit the web site: http://www.leezasplace.org