“Bargaining” is the official term for the third stage of grief, though you could also call it “Guilt.” The Bargaining stage is when you make your deals: “If only things get better I will ….. ” The deal you cut is along the lines of what you felt you should have been doing all along, except now you “really mean it.”
In my case that bargaining chip was becoming the major breadwinner. For about the first half of our marriage I was the major breadwinner. For the second half Cindy was the major breadwinner. In truth, she could have been the major breadwinner the whole time if we worked the same hours.
I’ve got a bunch of degrees; I’ve got various talents; I’ve got perseverance. Had I tried to leverage my PhD and technical training in GIS to its greatest potential I would have started at a hundred thousand. Instead, Cindy and I both valued family and community ahead of career; we both valued worthwhile careers over lucrative ones. We both wanted to raise our family in the community of Norfolk with one of us always available for the kids. For me that meant working at a nonprofit watershed organization, the Housatonic Valley Association. As the kids got older and needed less motherly supervision and more income I became more part time and Cindy more full time.
At some point I could see that Cindy was stressed and I spent some time laying the groundwork for income as a writer and speaker, thinking that had a higher ceiling than trying to find a new career in my fifties, plus offering the potential of work I would be glad to do until they had to cart me away. Yet before that could work as planned Cindy’s mental impairments started to surface, the ones that doctors claimed were not due to Alzheimer’s for about three years.
My bargaining ploy was determined. I vowed to be the major breadwinner if only Cindy’s mental health would get better. After we got back from hiking across the country I put in about 20 applications for various higher education jobs, having been a teacher before I was a GIS specialist, but at age 57/58 I did not get called for a single interview. In retrospect I can see that as a blessing but at the time I did not know Cindy had Alzheimer’s.
Since then I’ve worked part time as a program teacher for K-3. While this was a delightfully unique experience, college kids don’t come running up to hug you in the legs, it was not what I had in mind as a “major breadwinner.” Cindy’s Social Security disability had kicked in even before the diagnosis of Alzheimer’s, providing us a safety net, yet I tried a variety of writing, music and speaking angles to go along with the part time teaching in order to keep up “my end of the bargain.”
Now I can say the bargaining stage is over. Maybe I should have remained the major breadwinner for our entire marriage, but Cindy does not need a major breadwinner now. She just needs my care. In fact, had I been successful at getting a higher education job I would have needed to quit by now. I don’t even teach anymore and all my writing/composing/speaking efforts are centered around the Alzheimer’s cause.
Fortunately we live pretty simply. Cindy’s Social Security is enough to pay the bills, our retirement accounts are enough to pursue the bucket list. Having rid myself of the “bargaining” stage of grief I’m better focused as a caregiver now, enjoying life a bit more in the process rather than stressing out. There remained one other stage I had to get over first.
