FOR YOU, ON NATIONAL CAREGIVER DAY

You won't receive any cards or cakes for National Caregiver Day.  You won't be handed a box of chocolates or a new diamond ring either.  If you did, you would have made it or bought it and wrapped it yourself. 

That's the thing about caregiving, it's for someone else, usually someone we love.  And that's because caregivers learn, over time, how to derive deep satisfaction from a smile, a meal eaten by our loved one, washed hair, calmed anxieties and memories shared.  We don't need gifts of chocolates or diamond jewellery to understand how our loving acts are needed and appreciated (although we'd never turn down those earthly gifts, of course!). 

National Caregiving Day is an opportunity to reflect on the meaning of our caring lives and to thank ourselves, not for being perfect, but for being the best caregivers we know how to be.  National Caregiving Day is a chance to celebrate the nobility in our daily lives.  Because we are noble - more noble than bankers, clerks, lawyers, sales reps, even teachers and police officers.  Ours is the most noble work and all those working professionals know that theirmost noble work happens at home, with family.  Caregiving is the core of what is most meaningful in life - our most intimate relations with those we love who are vulnerable and need our care.  Caregiving teaches us all life's most important lessons.  Eventually, after years of giving care, we become wise elders - that is our reward, and it's a rich one.