“At least you learned from that mistake.”
I hear that from other entrepreneurs, and I have said it plenty of times myself. It’s true. We learn from experience. But isn’t it better to learn from somebody else’s?
Picture a brick wall. It’s high, and you can’t see either end of it. The ground under it is rock hard. You try climbing and slide back down. Digging is out. You walk east looking for the edge and never find it, then turn around and walk the other way with the same result.
So you quit. Or you ask for help.
Asking for help is not quitting. Asking for help is how you keep going. Caregivers hit walls all the time. Some of them turn out to be small obstacles you can step over. Others are thick molasses, and you can get through those too, slowly. Why walk it alone when somebody a little further down the road already knows where the ground is firm? You set the goal yourself: take care of your Tended (the person you are caring for). That’s the whole job. And you can’t pour from an empty cup. If there’s nothing left in you, there’s nothing left to give.
I told a new acquaintance yesterday that I can’t get to support groups. I never know when Gail will need me, and I don’t like making obligations that take me out of the house. Is that a weak excuse? Maybe it is. I want to share what I’ve learned, and I want some support for what I’m going through. She told me the group runs from two to six people, all women. Men come once and don’t come back. It isn’t that they’re unwelcome. They just stop showing up.
I told her I’ll be there. Ten o’clock, Friday.
How am I going to manage that? I’m going to ask for help, and I’m going to do it twice. I’ll ask that room of women for support. And I’ll ask somebody to come sit with Gail, with a good reason for being here that makes sense to her.
I don’t know yet whether I’ll make it. Friday morning could go sideways, and I could still be sitting right here at ten o’clock. I know how to say this. I don’t always know how to do it. But I’m going to ask.
Gregg
Get a letter like this every Tuesday.
