One of my all-time favorite books is The Art of Helping: What to Say and Do When Someone is Hurting by Lauren Littauer Briggs. In fact, I am very honored to have a section in it for those with chronic illness. But the whole book is helpful for those of us who, well, care. And it is one of the few books I believe should be on the desk of every pastor and church secretary! So much so that when it was first published we offered it as part of our HopeKeepers Start Up Kit! And I wrote a review for the book on Amazon in 2006 (see it under Lisa Copen “RestMinistries”)

I am so excited to see that the author, Lauren, is doing a blog tour to share about this book again, as it it never out of date! The Art of Helping—What to Say and Do When Someone is Hurting addresses 30 of the most common heartaches people face and takes away your fear of involvement by helping you understand what people are feeling and going through. From over 100 interviews and her own life experiences, Author Lauren Briggs shares proven advice and offers practical help with a list of what to say— and do. There is even a section on how to comfort people who have suffered the loss of a pet.

Lauren gave us a few minutes of her time to explain why she believes this book is one that is practical in the hands of many.

Why should I read The Art of Helping?

Do you know someone who is facing a crisis and wondered what you could do to help? Have you ever faced a difficult time and wished your family and friends knew what you were going through and knew how to help you?

I found that during my darkest hours, no one knew how much I was hurting, what I was going through or how they might help.

This is a book you’ll want to read before you need it—so that you will have ideas of what you can do and how you can respond—when you first hear the news. We want to help our family and friends through the hard times, but the right words or actions just don’t come to mind. The Art of Helping will give you the tools and enable you to turn thoughts into action.

If I was to ask you, “How will The Art of Helping change me?” what would you say?

The Art of Helping is your go to book when life gets tough. It is a social Bible filled with concrete, tangible action items to empower you to make a difference at times when we would otherwise feel helpless. When people get this book in their hands, they always say, “How I wish I had this book when my friend needed help.”

Yes, I think all of us who are chronically ill have often wished that people had a better idea of how to reach out to us. Sometimes when we live with illness, we think of everything in terms of that as our definition of suffering. But there are so many kinds of suffering in life! I wonder if you could share with us some of the basic Do’s and Don’ts that could be helpful for anyone–not just those with a chronic condition?

Sure! Here are some of my best tips!

DON’T wait before you make contact.
DO Respond as soon as you hear the news.

DON’T SAY “If there’s anything you need, give me a call.”
DO Offer a specific thing you can do.

DON’T put pressure on yourself to do something you don’t like to do.
DO use your gifts and talents to help.

DON’T minimize what they are going through.
DO offer caring statements of acknowledgement.

DON’T ASK “When will you be your old self again? or Aren’t you over it yet?”
DO understand that once their life is touched by tragedy, they will never be their “old self” again. They will eventually reach a “new normal” but life will never be the same.

Wonderful! Yes, I think those apply to anyone going through a difficult time. You have so many specific examples in the book. That is one of my favorite parts because it really personalizes it. Can you share with us some of your favorite creative suggestions in The Art of Helping?

Yes, here are some of my favorites!

• A mother of two young children picked up a hurting family’s laundry on Mondays, took it home and returned it all laundered and folded on Thursdays.
• A man volunteered to come mow the lawn once a week and do some simple “honey do” chores.
• My sons brought their game boy to the hospital for a friend going through chemo therapy. Every few days they would bring a different game to swap.

Those all sound wonderful. I know sometimes it’s the little things that make a huge difference for those of us who are hurting–both physically or emotionally. I am so glad to see that after a few years this book is still reaching so many people. It truly it timeless, Lauren. Can you tell our readers how they can I learn more about The Art of Helping?

The Art of Helping is reshaping the way people reach out to others. You can find more information at my website: www.laurenbriggs.com. You can also follow me on Facebook as and on Twitter as @Laurenbrgs. The Art of Helping is available both as an ebook and hard copy through Amazon.com. See the Kindle version here. If you would like an autographed copy of The Art of Helping, email me.

Thank you, Lauren! Readers! Lauren has graciously donated a copy of her book to one of you! Please take a moment to share a way that either (1) you encouraged someone who was hurting; (2) someone encouraged you when you were hurting; (3) a creative way you would like to encourage someone who is hurting.

We will pick the one that is most CREATIVE. . . so think hard! Post your comment below in the comments section and if you are chosen we will email you to get your postal address and Lauren will send the book right out!

Lisa Copen is the founder of Rest Ministries and she lives in San Diego with her husband and son. She is the author of Beyond Casseroles: 505 Ways to Encourage a Chronically Ill Friend, another great book to add to your “encouragement book shelf!” She is gradually learning how to balance motherhood, family, illness, and ministry, but she still knows it will be a lifetime lesson. You can see the books she has written, including, Why Can’t I Make People Understand? at the Rest Ministries shop.

In this scenario Mr. Robertson has shown the world that one’s personal comfort, especially in the case of having a spouse with a chronic illness, is more important than the marriage vows of “for better or for worse, until death do us part.”

The religious broadcaster Pat Robertson and chairman of the Christian Broadcasting Network (CBN) told his “700 Club” viewers that divorcing a spouse with Alzheimer’s is justifiable because the disease is “a kind of death.”

During the segment of the show where he answers questions from viewers, Robertson was asked what advice a man should give to a friend who began seeing another woman after his wife started suffering from the Alzheimer’s Disease.

He responds, “I know it sounds cruel, but if he’s going to do something, he should divorce her and start all over again, but make sure she has custodial care and somebody looking after her,” Robertson said.

When Terry Meeuwsen, Robertson’s co-host, asked him about couples’ marriage vows to take care of each other “for better or for worse” and “in sickness and in health” I thought he may be able to redeem himself, if he wasn’t sure what hole he had just dug for himself. . .but he didn’t.

“If you respect that vow, you say `til death do us part,’ This is a kind of death.”

It was perhaps this clarification that made me most annoyed me. Besides the statement on divorce, I was also frustrated to hear Robertson emphasize that, in the case of Alzheimer’s the person is “gone.”

He says, “I hate Alzheimer’s. It is one of the most awful things because here is a loved one—this is the woman or man that you have loved for 20, 30, 40 years. And suddenly that person is gone. They’re gone. They are gone.” (emphasis added). Robertson said that the viewer’s friend could obey the vow of “death till you part” because the disease was a “kind of death.”

Joel Hunter, senior pastor of the 15,000 member Northland Church in Orlando, FL is quoted as saying, “Obviously, you could do this for anything. … ‘My husband watches and plays video games, and so he has left the marriage and it’s kind of like a death,’” he said. “It’s not death, and so we can’t start describing things as death that are really not death, and we have to stop trying to mischaracterize what Scripture says for our own convenience.”

Though loved ones of a person who lives with Alzheimer’s Disease may feel the person they once knew has faded away, if that person is still alive on this earth–God still has a purpose and a plan of his or her life–regardless of how “meaningless” their life may seem to others.

My grandfather had Alzheimer’s and lived in assisted living at the end of his years. Even though in his 90s when he died, his memorial service was packed full of people who wanted to celebrate his life–many who didn’t even know him before the Alzheimer’s set in. He impacted many, many lives, even when he had little memory.

We never know what nurse may be living a life of abuse at home, what physical therapist has asked God for a sign of His faithfulness today, what doctor has just lost his wife to cancer. . . and that a patient with Alzheimer’s may be the one who encourages him or her that day.

Joni Eareckson Tada also made a public statement on her website Joni and Friends:

“I was dismayed when this week Pat Robertson said to a nationwide audience that Alzheimer’s disease is a kind of death that makes divorce justifiable. When a Christian leader views marriage on a sliding scale, what does this say to the millions of couples who must deal daily with catastrophic injuries and illnesses?”

Marriage is designed to be a picture of God’s sacrificial love for us. Alzheimer’s disease is never an ‘accident’ in a marriage; it falls under the purview of God’s sovereignty. In the case of someone with Alzheimer’s, this means God’s unconditional and sacrificial love has an opportunity to be even more gloriously displayed in a life together!”

To put a “value” on any life based on what one can remember or what one can do, is to make us all replaceable to our loved ones. What if my coping skills crack under the stress of chronic pain? What if my husband didn’t want to deal with me when I had the flesh eating bacteria? What if we all gave up on our spouse every time life got tough and we said, “S/he just isn’t the same person anymore. . . “?

Is every marriage like Noah and Allie in The Notebook? No, we don’t live in Hollywood. But could we learn something about their faithfulness to one another despite life’s difficulties, including Alzheimer’s? Yes.

May God open the eyes of Mr. Robertson, and may we cover the many in prayer who heard is message and now believe their acts of leaving a spouse who is suffering is justifiable because “they just aren’t the same person I married.”

It is a sad thing to see our Christian leaders conforming to the world’s views so that people can live a life of comfort, while sometimes the world, such as in the movie The Notebook gets it right, showing true compassion.

Video of the 700 Club broadcast

Video of touching scenes from The Notebook

Lisa Copen is the founder of Rest Ministries and she lives in San Diego with her husband and son. She is gradually learning how to balance motherhood, family, illness, and ministry, but she still knows it will be a lifetime lesson. You can see the books she has written, including, Why Can’t I Make People Understand? at the Rest Ministries shop.

This is part 2 of a 2 part article. Part 1 is here: Carrying Super Rachel – The Logistics of When Your Wife Is Chronically Ill

It’s tough to live your life with a chronic illness. Even with the best attitude and support system, you have bad days where you think futile thoughts. “I should be able to do this. . . anybody my age should!” When you can’t walk yourself across the room, it’s easy to become depressed.

Here are some of the ways I help my wife combat this mentality:

• I reinforce that she’s definitely worth something–in face, everything–to me.
• We both are an active part of our support group, the Texas Association for Dysautonomia Awareness.
• I encourage her to participate in things she can find joy in and so that she can stay mentally active and feeling useful while she’s at home. These include things like sewing projects, embroidering, and updating her web site.
  We laugh and make jokes. You must have a sense of humor.
• We make family time a priority, not just with each other, but with extended family too.
• We make time for friendships and reach out to others. We want to be able to offer assistance and help others whenever we can.
• She sees her illness as part of her ministry. With that said, if she becomes too inwardly focused, she is not “doing her part.”

Matt & Rachel

Here are some ways we stay spiritually in touch:

• If you can’t get out of the house (or walk to the other side of it), it’s hard to feel like an important member of the body of Christ. We try to make sure Rachel maintains her relationship with Jesus and the rest of the church.
• We regularly attend church (this is a must since I’m the youth pastor!)
• Sometimes, when Rachel feels really bad, I let her skip church–or rather, if she is feeling really poorly, I “make her” skip church, (ie. I don’t make her feel guilty for taking care of herself.)
• We keep sermon podcasts from our favorite preachers on her iPod.
• We try to have a daily “Family Worship Time,” where we read some scripture, pray, and sing together.

Why do I do all of this? She is my wife, but more than that, she is my superhero. . . and I love her.

Matt Horne is the wife of Rachel, who lives with Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome (POTS) and fibromyalgia, among other conditions. They have been married since December 2006 and Rachel is currently pregnant with her first child. Matt is the youth pastor at the First Baptist Church Hebron in Carrollton, Texas. You can visit his web site at http://www.matthorne.info .

Matt and Rachel

By Matt Horne

Caring for a chronically ill wife is not what I had envisioned when I was working up the nerve to ask out “that hot girl” who would later become my wife. We were in college and she was on the cross country team. She let me know very early on in the relationship that she had a chronic illness.

Nowadays, it’s just part of life. I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t know what to do with myself if she were well.

There’s a reason I call her “Super Rachel.” On her good days, she can run circles around me–cleaning, getting things checked off her to-do list, and having tons of fun. She’s amazing.

On top of that, she has the greatest attitude and rarely lets her condition get her down. As her dad says, she’s an “overcomer.” Instead of having a “why me?” attitude, she says “what can I do to fix it?” She also has the tendency to volunteer for more than she can handle, but I digress. . .

Here are some tips about the logistics I’d like to pass on to help other couples who are coping with chronic illness:

Career

Super Rachel can’t work sometimes. A couple years ago, she was working part-time, working on her Master’s degree in Exercise Physiology, and working as a Graduate Assistant at the university (to pay for school). She crashed. We worked it out so we don’t need her income and she can stay at home trying to feel better.

Priorities

She was forced to reevaluate her priorities. Rachel used every ounce of her energy to please everyone else and live up to their expectations. Sometimes she was not physically able to drive home at night and I would have to put on my shining armor and drive my mighty steed (Ford Ranger) to pick her up. We had very little free time as a couple. At that time, she decided to put God first and her family (me) second in her life. School, work, and everything else is important, but not that important.

Now that she’s feeling better, she only works 2 days a week and we carpool, so she doesn’t have to drive herself. Working two days a week at the doctor’s office is the peak of her current physical ability, but she has the opportunity to help others with the same chronic condition she has.

Mobility

I searched on craigslist.org for a walker and a go-cart. (Yes, I call it the go-cart. Yes, I know I’m wrong. It is a mobility scooter. No, I won’t change.) I got the walker for $50 ($175 off) and the go-cart for $300 ($1,000 off). The walker helps her get around the house when she’s at her worst health-wise. The go-cart helps us get the shopping done, among other things.

Shopping

I used to get really frustrated when she said she had enough energy to go shopping, but didn’t. Invariably, when we got just about five items down on the list, she would need to quit and go home. I had probably 25 more things to get. It really made me angry sometimes, but it wasn’t her fault. The walker and the scooter dramatically changed things. Now, for the first time in her life, she actually enjoys shopping.

Independence

To help her be more independent on her bad days, I installed a hand-held shower head in the bath tub and bought a shower chair. Now she can clean herself most of the time.

Comfort

We used to sleep on an incline, so there wouldn’t be as much of a change for her when she gets up in the mornings. This is a common treatment for Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome.

Cooking

It is very important for her to be able to eat when I’m not home, even when she can’t stand up. If you can’t stand for more than a few seconds, you obviously can’t cook on the stove top. We try to get a good number of things pre-cooked and in the freezer for her to re-heat and I’m not talking about “healthy-choice box dinners” either.

We like to do what is called “Once A Month Cooking,” or OAMC. We’re not very good at doing it regularly, but if you do it right, you can have wonderful dinners & lunches for very little cost, and it’s all home made! With OAMC, you create a plan, buy your stuff, cook all day, and then freeze it for later. Sometimes all day Saturday spills over into part of the day on Sunday.

When she’s desperate for some nutrition and doesn’t have the energy to cook, she uses the walker to get to the kitchen, musters what energy she has to get the food from the freezer to the microwave, and then sits down on the seat of the walker (or the floor) while it cooks. After that, she can eat right there in the kitchen. Some days, we use the bar stool in front of the stove or sink so that she can get some work done.

And I almost forgot – I do pick her up and carry her sometimes!

Tomorrow Matt will Share. . .

How a Husband Can Encourage a Chronically Ill Wife – The Spiritual and Emotional Stuff

Matt Horne is the wife of Rachel, who lives with Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome (POTS) and fibromyalgia, among other conditions. They have been married since December 2006 and Rachel is currently pregnant with her first child. Matt is the youth pastor at the First Baptist Church Hebron in Carrollton, Texas. You can visit his web site at http://www.matthorne.info .

By: Paul J. Donoghue, PhD and Mary E. Siegel, PhD

We all need to talk to relieve tension within us and to connect with people who matter to us. But those of us who are ill really need to talk. Illness threatens our well being, evokes strong emotions, heightens our needs, and makes us more dependent on others. To cope well with all these factors we need to talk. Yet illness often leads us to isolate, to retreat into out own world of pain, fatigue, vulnerability, and fear.

When we emerge from our silence, we frequently drive away those we need by blurting our thoughts formed by fear.
Blame:

You don’t care!
You don’t understand!
You only think of yourself.

Hopeless remarks:

Why don’t you just leave me?
I can’t take it anymore!
No one understands what it is like to live with pain.
No one cares.

Demands:

Take the children to my mother’s and pick up the prescription.
Take some days off so I can get some rest.
Call the insurance company today.
Don’t just stand there, do something.

We push those we need away by our fear-induced language as well as by our silent withdrawal.

We need to learn how to talk. That means we have to talk openly, honestly about our needs, our feelings, our thoughts in a manner that invites those we love to understand and to connect with us. We have to stop blaming, demanding, complaining, and learn to share our inner-most emotions such as discouragement and anxiety a well as our needs for attention and help.

After sharing thoughtfully with her husband, a woman undergoing cancer treatment told us, “Jay has been wonderful. I had to talk seriously with him about what I needed from him. Now he cooks when I’m not up to it. He cleans the house. He keeps the kids informed about my treatments. He goes to my doctor appointments with me. He told me that he had wanted to help but was afraid to, because he knows I like to do things for myself. I had to learn how to let him in on my illness.”

This husband and wife learned to apply basic communication skills in their conversations. The following are some practical tips for expressing your needs, feelings, and wishes in a way that makes it more possible that you will be understood:

1. Take some time to reflect before talking. What do you really want to get across? What is your intention in speaking? To get help? To be understood? To clarify your thoughts?

2. Identify and share your feelings directly. For example:

Direct sharing of feelings: “I felt vulnerable and helpless when you and the girls made dinner.”

Rather than blaming and judging: “You paid so much attention to the girls and totally ignored me.”

Sharing your feelings requires that you identify them before you speak. After identifying your feelings, such as loneliness, sadness, hope, fear, excitement, appreciation, hurt, frustration, share them by saying “I” then the feeling. Then give the reason for the feeling. For example: “I felt sad when I realized that I didn’t have the energy to make the trip to the reunion.”

3. Identify and share your needs; need for specific help, need for a conversation about treatment options, need for a ride to the store, need for rest or exercise or a phone call from a friend. Share your need directly. To do so, start with the world “I” followed by your need.

Direct sharing of needs:

“I need you to call the insurance company.”
“I need to leave the party early tonight.
“I need help to decide whether I should go back to the physical therapist.”

Rather than demanding and criticizing:

“You always leave the tough phone calls to me.”
“You never want to leave a party no matter how late it is.”
“You have to help me figure this out.”

People with illnesses definitely need to talk. But the talking needs to be thoughtful and skillful. Nobel Peace Prize recipient, Desmond Tutu writes, “It requires courage to be honest, but it also requires skill.” He was kind to add that in our book We Really Need to Talk: Steps to Better Communication (Sorin Books 2010), “Drs. Donoghue and Siegel teach in a deeply human ways the skills needed to communicate with genuine love.” We hope that you will learn to improve you ability to share yourself in order to gain the relief and comfort and support that you need and deserve.

bIO GOES HERE

Don Piper Ministries is holding it’s first ever “Hope Summit,” May 21-22, 2010 at First Baptist Church Pasadena, Texas.

Many have asked if there would ever be an event held where they could come, bring family & friends, & hear Don’s messages of hope & healing in person. Don & Eva Piper, Nash 3, Anita Onarecker Wood, Pray Guillory & Nicole Flenniken! You’ll receive tremendous encouragement for eternity & for this present life.

Register or find additional information at the web site.