Rosanne Corcoran: The Emotional Challenges of Caregiving

Next Avenue readers were first introduced to Rosanne Corcoran's caregiving story with the essay "Dear Dementia" which she wrote as part of Next Avenue's 2020 "Telling Our Stories" initiative. In the piece, she movingly talks about her mother's dementia and its effect on her family:

You took a beautiful, independent, light of a woman and turned her into someone whose world has been shrunken to one room. How you managed to remove that light in her eyes I'll never know. What I do know is that you have changed all of our lives forever. 

In 2019, while in the midst of caring for her mother, Corcoran launched "Daughterhood The Podcast" which was inspired by the Daughterhood Circles created by a 2018 Next Avenue Influencer in Aging, Anne Tumlinson.

The monthly podcast, which Corcoran hosts, focuses on the emotional challenges of being a caregiver and features experts talking about topics such as the last days of hospice care, siblings and caregiving, the "grieving brain" and compassion fatigue.

Corcoran, who lives in Delaware, spoke to Next Avenue about the challenges of caregiving as well as what happens after caregiving ends and how she hopes "Daughterhood The Podcast" can help fill the void caused by a lack of support many caregivers experience during and after their time spent being so present for a loved one.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

In 2015, I had just moved my mom into the house and I was up at 3 a.m. trying to find information on how to make sense of all of this, of caregiving. I came upon Daughterhood, which was started by Anne Tumlinson, and its Circles where people could meet and talk about being a caregiver. I thought it would be great to start a Circle, but I was in this whole swirl of activity (with my mom).

When I was finally able to hire a caregiver to come in and give me a break during the day, it was October 2018. I reached out to Daughterhood and said, 'I'd love to start a Circle' and I did that in January 2019.   

Our Circle met in person at the beginning (pivoting to virtual meetings during the pandemic) and I was overcome by stories that I was hearing because we were all feeling the same way. And I couldn't figure out, why isn't anybody talking about this? Why isn't anybody really discussing the anxiety, stress, guilt, grief and everything that underlies caregiving – that nobody talks about because it's uncomfortable? People would say to me (about caring for my mom) 'Oh, good for you. You're doing this.' But I'm drowning and I don't know why I'm drowning.

When we moved my mom in with us, my oldest was just starting her senior year in high school and my youngest was starting eighth grade. It's that feeling of here are my kids, and they're growing up and they're growing out, and here's my mom, she's getting older and she's on her way out. They're all on their way out. And I'm trying to balance and spend time with each of them and never feeling like I'm in the right place.

When I was looking for resources, I wanted to find the kind of answers I needed. I was finding 'you do this and this and this' as a caregiver, but that didn't help my feelings. I thought 'this is ridiculous' and I got angry and decided that I was going to start a podcast. I have the background (she earned a BA in English and Communications from Cabrini University in Radnor, Pennsylvania, then later a certificate in broadcasting) and I thought, I'm just going to do it. In November 2019, I started a podcast in my walk-in closet, and I did it monthly. At the time, I was actively caring, and I knew that I couldn't do what I wanted to do at the level I wanted to do it if I did it more than once a month.

My mom died in 2021, she was 92. She'd been living with us for six years, but in the six years before she moved into our house, I was trying to support her living independently – visiting her every day, taking her to her doctors. I was part of her care team even before she needed a care team.

The podcast didn't change in terms of the level of what I was doing each month. Some of the content changed because, again, nobody talks about what happened (after the death of the loved one), what did I just witness and what am I supposed to do with that now? How am I supposed to move forward?

What I found personally was grief is a lot like caregiving. People want you to feel better, but they don't want to talk about it. You still have that same isolation. People really don't know what to do with you: 'Are you better? No, I'm not better.'

I had people say, well, aren't you happy now you've got your life back. But my life is completely different than when I started (caregiving). They don't get that. Or they'll say, 'You can do anything.' No, I can't do anything, along with the fact my health is completely different than it was because of the stress and the grind that was caregiving.

I find that advocates and people in this (caregiving) world will absolutely speak freely about caregiving. It's a gift to find others willing to open up to that, because it's vulnerability. On both parts, on my part and on their part, and on what they're willing to disclose and what they're willing to share. Because it's hard.

[I'm always happy to] find that person able to get behind this microphone and say to listeners, 'This is not bad. This is not something that makes you crazy.' Because you do feel crazy. You feel like, 'Well, I should be over it by now.' And you can't be over it. It's grief. It's exhausting enough to try to live with the grief and then try to put on a happy face for other people, so they don't feel bad. If the person that I speak to on the podcast can give a message to somebody who's listening, who's sitting in their chair thinking, 'I don't know what I'm going to do,' and that makes them feel better, that's everything for me.

There's nothing quite like it for me when a caregiver emails me and says, 'You made me feel less alone.' Or 'I learn something in every episode,' or 'you keep me company and make me feel seen.'

It's an honor for me to hear them say that because I know how they're feeling. I know what it's like to be in your house and think that nobody gets what you're doing. So, to have somebody feel seen and validated, it's everything.

My mom was almost 40 when I was born, and she was the second youngest of 12 siblings. Growing up, I was surrounded by all these people who were over 60, 70, 80 – her siblings, her friends. I always thought they were so awesome – so vital and important. For me, I don't think age is a good enough marker for vitality.

And because I also had such vital older role models, I know you can't just judge somebody on one thing. It's just not fair. And to think that we know everything we have to know about somebody because of their age is just wrong.

Julie Pfitzinger is the managing editor for Next Avenue and senior editor for lifestyle coverage. Her journalism career has included feature writing for the Star-Tribune, as well as several local parenting and lifestyle publications, all in the Twin Cities area. Julie also served as managing editor for nine local community lifestyle magazines. She joined Next Avenue in October 2017. Reach her by email at [email protected]. Read More