Finding Peaceful Presence in Caregiving and Relationships

How to Support Someone You Love Without Trying to Fix Everything

By Dr. Katie Eastman, Psy.D., LICSW

When someone we love is hurting, our first impulse is often to fix the problem. We bring advice, food, information, appointments, and reassurance. These can be loving gifts. But when the pain cannot be quickly fixed, what a person may need most is something much quieter: someone willing to stay present. That is especially true in caregiving, where two people can be grieving different losses at the same time.

Think about someone you love who has been hurting. Perhaps they were grieving a death. Perhaps they received a diagnosis, lost a job, or became less independent. What did you want to do? If you’re like most of us, you wanted to help. You may have offered advice, researched solutions, arranged transportation, cooked a meal, or said, “It’s going to be okay.”

Those acts can be wonderful. But they can also become a way of moving past the emotional reality too quickly. What if the person doesn’t need another solution right now? What if they need someone willing to sit with what cannot yet be fixed?

When I say stay, I don’t mean remain in an abusive relationship, ignore your own health, or make yourself available every minute. I mean a quality of presence that says: “You don’t have to act cheerful for my benefit. You don’t need to explain your feelings perfectly. I can be here with you as you are.”

Caregiving is a powerful place to practice that kind of peace. It is also one of the places where we can lose our own sense of peace most quickly.

Imagine a woman caring for her husband after an illness. Their days are filled with medications, appointments, and decisions. She loves him deeply. But she also misses their spontaneous conversations, their shared plans, and the feeling that they were equal partners in everyday tasks. She may feel guilty for grieving those things because her husband is the one who is ill.

Now imagine her husband. He may be grateful for her help while grieving his independence, privacy, confidence, or control. When she asks whether he needs assistance, he snaps, “I can do it myself.” She feels rejected. He feels diminished. Suddenly, an ordinary moment becomes a conflict.

What happened beneath the surface?

Both may be carrying losses that haven’t been named.

I often distinguish between tangible losses and intangible losses. Tangible losses are the things we can more easily see: health, mobility, sleep, income, time. Intangible losses include identity, dignity, autonomy, certainty, trust, and the future we thought we were going to have.

Those intangible losses can be just as painful. And because they are invisible, we sometimes mistake grief for stubbornness or ingratitude.

So here is my first invitation: before asking, “How do I solve this?” consider asking, “What might this person be losing? And what might I be losing, too?”

Across my work with grieving individuals and families, I return to three fundamental needs: safety, validation, and presence.

Safety means that someone can tell the truth about their feelings without being punished for having them. They can be afraid, angry, exhausted, or uncertain.

Validation means we acknowledge their experience without needing to agree with every conclusion. We might say, “Losing the ability to drive has been painful for you,” without pretending we can change the medical reality.

And presence means we are willing to listen—to be attentive, to allow silence, to stay curious.

Think about the difference between two responses to an aging parent who says, “I hate having to ask for rides.” One response is, “Well, at least you’re safe. You need to accept it.” Another is, “I hear how much you miss that freedom. What has been hardest about it?”

Both may come from love. But the second allows the parent to remain the expert on their own experience. Then, together, you can discuss what will help.

I often say, compassion begins when we stop fixing and start accompanying. That doesn’t mean we abandon medical care, advocacy, practical planning, or safety. It means we remember there is a person inside every problem we’re trying to solve.

I learned so much about that from children and young people facing serious illness. In my book UPLIFTING: Inspiring Stories of Loss, Change, and Growth, I share the story of Jason, who wanted his experience with cancer to make a difference. He had his own voice, his own hopes, and his own way of making meaning. Our role was not to tell him how brave to be. It was to recognize the whole person and hear what mattered to him.

The same principle belongs in every caregiving relationship. An older adult, a partner with a disability, a child in treatment, each person deserves to be consulted, respected, and included in decisions wherever possible.

There is another question every caregiver deserves to hear: Who is accompanying you?

Caregivers often believe they must be strong for everyone. They may hide exhaustion, disappointment, anger, or sadness because they fear these feelings mean they are not loving enough. Yet love and grief can coexist. Gratitude and frustration can coexist. You can be devoted to someone and still miss the life you shared before things changed.

Peaceful presence requires boundaries. You might say, “I want to give you my full attention, and I need a few minutes to rest first.” Or, “I can do Tuesday, but we need a plan for Thursday.” Or, “I care about you, and this is more than I can safely manage alone.”

Healthy boundaries do not cancel compassion. They make it possible to sustain compassion over time.

Before a challenging interaction, I invite you to take a brief compassionate pause. Notice your feet on the ground. Relax your shoulders. Take a comfortable breath. Ask yourself, “Is my response being driven by this person’s needs—or by my fear, urgency, or desire to fix?”

You may discover that you want to reassure because you’re frightened. You may realize you’re taking an expression of grief personally. There is no need to shame yourself. Awareness creates a choice.

Then try a sentence that opens the conversation: “Tell me what this has been like for you.” “What do you miss most?” “Would you like me to listen or help think through options?” Or simply, “I don’t have the perfect words, but I am here.”

Try this peace practice. Choose one person you’re caring for or supporting. Ask what has been hardest about the changes they’re experiencing. Let them answer without interrupting. Reflect one thing you heard. Then ask what might help them feel more like themselves.

And if you’re the caregiver, please ask yourself those questions, too. You deserve safety, validation, and presence.

The circumstances may not immediately change. The diagnosis may remain. The caregiving tasks may still be there tomorrow. But something important can shift when both people feel seen. We can move from managing one another to accompanying one another.

Peace doesn’t always begin with an answer. Sometimes it begins when someone stays.

A question to carry forward

Who in your life needs more listening than fixing right now? And who can offer that same presence to you?

Continue Practicing Peace

Explore Practicing Peace, a free 12-lesson audio course with Elizabeth Hamilton-Guarino and Dr. Katie Eastman, coauthors of The Peace Guidebook. Discover practical ways to navigate stress, difficult emotions, relationships, grief, and life changes with greater awareness and compassion.

Listen to the free course: https://www.besteveryouacademy.com/freeinnerpeacecourse

Pause. Breathe. Choose.

About the Author

Dr. Katie Eastman is a licensed psychotherapist, Master Grief & Transition Coach, and organizational change consultant with more than forty years of experience helping individuals, families, and leaders navigate grief, loss, and change. She is the coauthor, with Elizabeth Hamilton-Guarino, of the international bestselling The Peace Guidebook: How to Cultivate Hope, Healing, and Harmony for the Good of Humankind, and author of UPLIFTING: Inspiring Stories of Loss, Change, and Growth. Through counseling, coaching, speaking, and consulting, she helps people recognize unacknowledged losses and move from uncertainty toward meaning and compassionate action. Learn more at DrKatieEastman.com and PercolatePeace.com.