When your family member/friend moves into a care facility, your daily activities will change. You may notice changes in tasks, sleeping patterns, eating habits, diet, career, or social interactions. This can include anything that affects or alters the way you are used to living.

Examples:

• Changes in routine as your family member/friend moves into care
• Sleeping difficulties
• Changes in hobbies, leisure activities
• Feeling guilty about not always being with your family member/friend in care
• Planning your life around your own schedule rather than your family member's/friend's schedule
• Changes to your financial situation, now that you are paying for a care facility

Examples from others who have experienced these changes:

"There's the loss of a job, because I took early retirement. And I mean, I loved my job and I loved all the people I worked with, and it gave me that sense of empowerment. It also takes away some of your identity."

"Once you put somebody into care, that because you've been the caregiver for so long, it's hard to-you're still planning your life around that person."

"I think more about his goals than my goals."

"Think about what you want to do for yourself. Then I realized, you know what, I don't know what to do any more."

"I went from doing everything, like deciding what he'd wear, when he'd shower, when he'd shave, all of that stuff, that you're still the caregiver for that person, but you're-well, initially you become the parent to that person instead of the spouse or the child or whatever-you change your relationship. It was kind of difficult to live with somebody that had been your partner and is now your child sort of thing, and then you relinquish that to somebody else."

"Learning to plan your day around you instead of planning your day around your visits to your person that you're caring for."

"So I was still planning my life around his schedule, and you're right, it's something you have to do, to separate from that and plan your life around your schedule and fit him in. You still are taking care of that person, you're still an advocate for that person, but then you're fitting them into your schedule, not your schedule around them. It's something that's not easy to do."