Is it normal to feel depressed? Yes. Being faced with a life altering, and potentially fatal disease definitely has the ability to body check one into a state of depression. You really need to maintain your composure and be alert as possible as a caregiver, but when you have a moment to yourself, a chance to try to catch up on sleep, it's not out of the ordinary if you find yourself trapped in a funk. In fact, it got to where I would feel guilty if I laughed at something or if I had an opportunity to go out and actually have some fun.
I would think that I should be back at the hospital, or doing research, or contacting doctors and looking through charts to make sure the right drugs were taken when they were suppose to be taken. Getting depressed watching a loved one go through treatment is all too common. There was an elderly gentleman that I befriended on the oncology floor. His wife was going through tx the same time my mom was. I could see in his eyes how upset he was. We would talk for hours. His children lived out of state, so he was essentially on his own while he was caring for his wife and trying to keep his own sanity. There are some radical changes, both physical and emotional, that you may encounter. There was no warning from the medical staff as to how big some of the changes could be, thus not perparing me for what I was about to experience. You quickly adjust though, but I think seeing the changes really hit home as to how serious an illness we were dealing with. Genereally the depression would hit the moment I was able to leave the hospital, out of the sight of my loved ones. I didn't want them to know it was difficult on me. It wasn't uncommon to drive home wiping tears out of my eyes or running scenarios over and over in my head as I was trying to fall asleep. I didn't take advantage of any counseling or any caregiver outreach programs, but I think I should have. Outside of OCF, I pretty much turned inward and kept the stress and depression bundled up. Not a good idea. I developed heart palpatations and terrible stress related lower back pain that left me virtually unable to walk upright for a spell.
I think a caregiver wants to and needs to maintain strong, but depression is a given. I wish I knew how to avoid it, but I have recently found that exercise and breathing deeply can be beneficial. Others I know have found religion to be helpful. Throughout the entire treatment period for my parents, and even during my mom's recovery, I have dealt with varying degress of depression. Fortunately, as we have been on the mend, the depression has dissipated. I have come to terms with everything that has happened. I have stopped trying to figure out why this happened and who, if anybody, might be responsible for not catching it earlier. I live life differently than I did precancer. I try to enjoy it more and appreciate things that I didn't necessarily notice before. As for meds and what you need to know, I suggest reading all you can read about the drugs your loved one will be given. From that standpoint, the hospital was very helpful. They would make printouts for me that explained what the drug did, what potential side effects you might expect and then i would get online and out of my own paranoia read more about the drugs and make sure whether or not they were safe in my mind, and safe to be used with other meds that were part of the protocal. I went so far as emailing doctors at other hospitals to ask their opinions of the protocol. All of them were kind to respond, probably thinking I was some type of nut, but I wanted to have my opinion based on my novice understanding and I wanted the opinions of multiple medical specialists from top notch cancer centers. I wanted to know how doses of the meds and radiation were determined. Doing so, in my mind, prepared me better to keep an eye on things. I always took notes of what drug was given, at what time and with what frequency. Kept a book of blood counts, daily weight, oxygen saturation, pulse, what drugs caused adverse side effects, what drugs worked well. This info always was good to have on hand when going to the ER. I also carried this info and copies of test results around in the event that we wound up in the ER of another hospital. It's important to have a good handle on the meds because there can be so many involved and a caregiver really has to have an idea of what the meds do and how the pt. reacts to them.