A Caregiver's Survival Guide: How to Stay Healthy When Your Loved One is Sick [Paperback]

Kay Marshall Strom (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 5, 2000

When you are responsible for another person's physical needs, your own needs are often neglected. After caring for her spouse, who for ten years suffered from a rare, debilitating disease, Kay Marshall Strom is able to bring a voice of experience and compassion to this important topic. She shows you how to

• find spiritual support
• maintain balanced relationships
• decide when caregiving at home is no longer possible
• work out your financial situation
• understand the impact of long-term caregiving on the whole family
• deal with your personal losses

Whether you are caring for an elderly parent, a spouse, an adult child or another family member or close friend, Strom's stories drawn from her own and othes' experiences will encourage and comfort you. And her practical ideas for how to meet your own needs for energy, patience, strength, wisdom, peace and creativity will carry you through many difficult days.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

A professional writer based in Eugene, Oregon, Kay Marshall Strom has written more than thirty books. She now partners with her husband (Daniel Kline) as Kline, Strom International, Inc., and together they have spoken on various topics to well over 100,000 people in more than twenty countries.

Product Details

• Paperback: 153 pages
• Publisher: IVP Books (July 5, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0830822305
• ISBN-13: 978-0830822300
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.5 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #489,397 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

I am a writer and speaker who loves learning about the world. And what better way to learn than to travel? My dear husband puts up with me... even accompanies me on occasion.

Of course, the more I learn, the more I want to write. And then I want to jump up on my soapbox and share all my insights and ideas.

For years I've been known as a writer of non-fiction. That's still true, but I am also having the time of my life writing fiction. Sometimes there is no better way to share a passion than through a rollicking good story! I just finished writing one historical trilogy, "Grace in Africa," (Book 1: The Call of Zulina, Book 2: The Voyage of Promise, Book 3: The Triumph of Grace). Now I'm working on the next series, "Blessings in India." What fun! It's like eating my chocolate dessert when I haven't finished my broccoli!

Come, explore the world with me. Together we'll strive to make it a better place.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

13 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Lifesaver, May 28, 2001

By A Customer

This review is from: A Caregiver's Survival Guide: How to Stay Healthy When Your Loved One is Sick (Paperback)

I am currently suffering from liver cancer. Although I am doing pretty well so far, I bought Strom's book for my husband who will end up being my caregiver. I even wrote suggestions in the margins for him (people to call on for respite for help, etc.) I hate to think of what is ahead for me, but it is a bit easier knowing my husband has a guide that I have been able to personalize. Bless you, Kay Marshall Strom. I wish I could give your book 10 stars!

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Practical Guide for Any Caregiver, July 31, 2006

By 

W. Terry Whalin "Publisher/ Editor / Writer" (Scottsdale, Arizona) - See all my reviews

This review is from: A Caregiver's Survival Guide: How to Stay Healthy When Your Loved One is Sick (Paperback)

When a family health crisis hits, the focus shifts to that particular person. Daily trips to the hospital or detailed medical care becomes the priority. Kay Marshall Strom has written A CAREGIVER'S SURVIVAL GUIDE, HOW TO STAY HEALTH WHEN YOUR LOVED ONE IS SICK (InterVarsity Press).

Kay knows first hand the struggles of such a situation. Over a period of ten years, her husband, Larry, went from a business manager at a major corporation to severe dementia and the progressive loss of the use of his arms and legs. For the last four years of his life, he was in a nursing home because he was too dangerous for Kay to care for at home.

In a crisis, the caregiver is rarely addressed and this book meets a special need. As Kay says, "Struggling blindly wears out the human spirit. Knowing what to expect, and when and where to go for help, makes the journey bearable. Accepting God as the first and primary "resource" brings blessing out of disaster."

This book helps caregivers cope with the emotional roller coaster, fitting into their new role, discovering the balance between personal care and care for the loved one, handling life with limited resources and letting go. The appendices for the book include a nursing home checklist and additional resources. As Joni Eareckson Tada writes in the foreword for the book, "Kay has experienced a lifetime of lessons and has catalogued invaluable insights to pass along to other caregivers."

The book is a careful mixture of personal-been-there experience, practical checklist type advice as well as a dependence on God to meet our needs.

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A compassionate journey of sharing, January 3, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: A Caregiver's Survival Guide: How to Stay Healthy When Your Loved One is Sick (Paperback)

Almost 20 years ago, I lost my first wife to colon cancer. I wish I'd known then what I've learned from Kay Marshall Strom's excellent "Caregiver's Survival" book. Like many people suddenly caught up in the role of caregiver, I was unprepared mentally, physically, and emotionally for the role. I did my best then, but it was far short of what I could have done for her, for the children, and for myself--had I only known. My hope now is that this book will find its way to where it's needed: to those facing the prospect of providing the primary care for a loved one in failing health, so that this extremely painful journey can be made more tolerable by Ms. Strom's tender, Christian insights and advice. She connects to the reader by laying bare her own doubts and hardships in more than 7 years of caring for her terminally ill husband. Her book is filled with the dignity, respect, and hope that, through God's inspiration, can be developed in even the most hopeless of cases.