Being Overwhelmed

Just like most adults, I have been overwhelmed many times in my life.  I have had three small children and a husband who all needed my help at the same time.  I have taught school and had numerous students at once need my help, etc.
But those things were nothing in comparison to what I felt in the days after this accident occurred.  I felt as if the weight of the entire world were on my shoulders.  I know it wasn't, but that is what it felt like to me.
I needed to take care of my kids, contact family members to let them know what happened, and keep them updated, get legal papers for the hospital, take over responsibilities that were not normally mine (like paying the bills), dealing with numerous insurance companies at once (health, auto, accidental death and dismemberment, short and long term disability insurance, income insurance, life insurance).  I talked to attorneys (there will be a post about that later.) I had to deal with issues at Richard's work, my work, write emails to keep everyone informed, etc.  I was concerned about how I was going to file my taxes, which Richard had always done before.  I needed to arrange for a place to stay for some family members who came into town. Oh yea, and we were having work done on our house at the time as well.  In fact, I had a trench dug around my entire backyard that was sitting there open for months!  (We had completed running a gas line from the kitchen to the fireplace just before the accident.) When my father came that summer, we were taking up tile flooring to put in new flooring, and my dad, at over 80 years old was out there hauling tile out of my house!  We were also dealing with the aftermath of a very bad kitchen install done by Lowe's and that had to be taken out and re-intalled by someone else which involved many different companies coming and giving estimates on what that was going to cost. That was about the time the accident happened, so I had to make the decision on which company to hire and get that going, and negotiate with Lowe's on a settlement for their terrible install.  State Farm was threatening to cancel our car insurance so I was calling around seeing if we could get insurance elsewhere. I saw a counselors, social workers and doctors, lots of them. I was reading books that taught me much about dealing with the faith that I needed to make it through it all.
When I got home the first time, I remember just shaking as I tried to start to accomplish all that needed to be done there while my husband sat in the hospital dying. To say that I was overwhelmed was an understatement.
I remember once, when I got a phone call from Richard's work saying that I had not paid my health insurance, which for some strange reason had to be paid to a different address than it had before, I just said, "I have so many fires going right now that I am dealing with the raging ones.  The ones that are smoldering are not getting my attention."
I did have help.  I had volunteers to help with much of what was going on, and I couldn't have done it without them, but the truth was, I was in charge of telling them what needed to be done, which took a lot more mental organization than I had at the time. There are also privacy laws that make it impossible for people to help you with many things. It would have been great if people could help with some things, but legally, they could not, not even my own children could do many things that needed to be done.
I remember each night that I took time to be grateful for what I had accomplished, trying not to dwell on all that still had to be done.  I felt guilty everytime I drove home to get some things accomplished because I wasn't there at the hospital if Richard needed me.
I did take some medication.  I took Xanax and Ambien, because I couldn't have slept at all without it.

My best advice about this stress is:

• Breathe!  
• Pray! 
• Don't take it one day at a time.  Take it one hour or minute at a time. It makes it seem less overwhelming.  
• Take time each evening to realize all you got done each day and acknowledge those things.
• Don't feel guilty for what you missed or what you didn't get to. Realize your limitations.  Tomorrow is a new day.
• Be grateful for those people in your life that are sitting beside you, that didn't go away when things got hard.
• Accept help. 
• Find joy in anything that you can.  (Richard's feet started peeling, and I loved peeling the skin off of his feet! He would never let me do that if he was awake and alert!) 
• Have some Xanax on hand, and use it.  
• I went to the temple (hopefully you have some similar place of peace and strength.) 
• Look back occasionally on how far your loved one has come, even within the last couple of days or last week.  
• Take comfort in the knowledge that others have been through similar things, and lived to tell the tale.  

The Albuquerque Temple that provided a place of peace for me.