So. I just returned from probably the biggest adventure of my life—a hiking and writing trip to the Picos de Europa in northern Spain. Throw in traveling alone for over twenty-four hours to a country where I don’t speak the language to meet up with a group of strangers, and the definition of adventure was made.
I felt prepared for the hiking, having hiked for several years now. Too, I was given the distances and the elevation changes and felt that I could physically do it, even though I had never hiked for five consecutive days. What surprised me most was the variety of the terrain. We hiked on roads, narrow paths cut into rock ledges, cow tracts of deep mud, and steep rock-strewn trails. We hiked through meadows, forests, glacier valleys, pastures, fern glades, and barren rock faces. With the help of trekking poles, I kept my balance and injured neither feet nor knees.
I was on less sure footing with the writing portion of this adventure. I had no idea what to expect. Our writing coach, Minton Sparks (see her website “here” https://mintonsparks.com/ ), is wildly creative in her writing and storytelling, and I was worried that I might feel like a dullard, but I was put at ease by the method she used. Each day, we were given a loose writing prompt and fifteen minutes to write nonstop. We then gathered, and each of us read aloud what we had written, if we chose to, while the rest listened carefully and took notes. Afterwards, we gave only positive feedback about what worked in the writing. It was very affirming.
I set off on this adventure without really knowing what to expect. I didn’t read ahead or study the history and landscape beforehand as I normally would have. I think it’s because I was not in charge. I trusted the leaders and just went where I was told to go, ate what was placed in front of me, and slept in the arranged accommodations. Check out Blue Sky Trekking “here” https://www.blueskytrekking.com/
What if we thought of traveling in Alzheimer’s world in this way? Instead of viewing our time spent giving care to our loved ones living with dementia as time spent in a desert wilderness, what if we viewed it as an adventure? Perhaps we could be freed of some of the anxiety that planning poses, especially when our plans don’t pan out the way we had hoped. Ultimately, we are not in charge of what happens on a daily basis when we are caregivers. Maybe it’s best to accept each moment as it comes, meeting our loved ones exactly where they are, and treating our time together as an adventure.
Who will I meet today? What can I do to maybe have some fun with my loved one? How can I creatively change my approach to caregiving to get a better result? Let’s see what happens when I play her favorite music. I wonder if he will interact with this robotic dog. What if we try cooking a simple dinner together?
Instead of getting lost, parched, and discouraged in a barren landscape of caregiving, try seeing it as an adventure.