Refuel #16

Build your support system 🆘

Author

Judith A. Culp
June 22, 2025

🔥 Refuel | Issue #16
A Newsletter from Faith + Gasoline
📅 Subject: “Who’s On Your Team?” – How to Build a Circle of Care That Actually Helps

🛠️ Welcome to Refuel

Hey fam,

Caregiving will teach you this quickly:
You can’t do it alone. Don’t even try to do it alone.

You need a team.
Not just family. Not just friends.
A real team—with roles, communication, and people you can trust when things get messy. This is especially important for those who continue to work and take on caregiving.

This issue is all about how to build that team.
From doctors to home health, from hospice to part-time caregivers—here’s who should be in your circle and how to choose wisely.

🔥 This Week’s Theme: You Need a Circle, Not a Burden

📖 Verse of the Week:
“Plans fail for lack of counsel, but with many advisers they succeed.” – Proverbs 15:22

You weren’t meant to carry this alone.
You need wisdom. You need backup.
You need people who care—and know what they’re doing.

🚗 Story from the Road: I Thought I Had to Be Everything

When my mom got diagnosed with Alzheimer’s, I became her everything:
Cook. Driver. Doctor’s interpreter. Therapist. Nurse. Advocate.

And it was overwhelming at times.

The day I finally asked for help, everything changed.
I asked my brother to help cover the caregiving expenses.
I found someone who could come in, and she treated my mom like she was HER relative.
And eventually, a hospice team that made her last months sacred instead of chaotic.

It took time to get everyone on the same page, but by the end, it was a well-oiled machine built on precision timing.

👥 The Core Caregiving Team: Who You Need and Why

🩺 1. Primary Care Physician (PCP)

  • Anchor point for referrals and prescriptions

  • Should listen, track changes, and coordinate care
    📌 Ask: Do they know how to manage chronic illness or memory decline?

    My mother’s favorite doctor left his practice, and I scrambled through two mediocre ones to finally find one good one in the last year of her life. Remember, they work for you, so you can fire a bad or negligent doctor.

🧠 2. Specialists (Neurologist, Cardiologist, etc.)

  • For targeted diagnoses: Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, heart failure, etc.

  • Can recommend treatments and order critical tests
    📌 Ask: Are they proactive or just reactive? Do they explain things clearly?

🏡 3. Home Health Agency

  • Sends nurses, physical therapists, and aides to your home

  • Covered by Medicare with a doctor’s order if your loved one is “homebound.”
    📌 Ask:

  • Are you Medicare-certified?

  • Do you have the same nurse each visit?

  • Do you communicate with the family regularly?

🕊️ 4. Hospice Care

  • For end-of-life care, comfort, and dignity, not treatment

  • Can be provided at home, in a facility, or in a hospice house

    Remember when you do hospice at home, YOU have to do everything they would be doing in a hospital at the end of life.
    📌 Ask:

  • Do they provide 24/7 support?

  • Will they help with equipment, meds, and pain relief?

  • Can I interview the team before enrolling?

🧹 5. In-Home Caregiver or Aide

  • Helps with bathing, dressing, meals, meds—but not medical care

  • Can be hired privately or through an agency
    📌 Ask:

  • Are they trained in dementia care? CPR?

  • Will we have a consistent schedule and person?

  • How do you handle emergencies or missed shifts?

  • Elder law attorney, financial planner, Medicaid specialist

  • Helps you protect assets and make sure care is funded
    📌 Ask:

  • Can you help us create/update a living will or trust?

  • How do we prepare for long-term care financially?

⛽ Quick Refuel: 5 Steps to Building a Solid Team

✅ 1. Start early—even before you think you need it.
Interview doctors and caregivers when things are calm.

✅ 2. Get a binder or digital hub.
Track contacts, prescriptions, insurance, and diagnoses in one place.

✅ 3. Vet and verify everyone.
Ask for background checks, credentials, and referrals—especially for in-home care.

✅ 4. Communicate clearly.
You are the point guard. Keep everyone updated and looped in.

✅ 5. Trust your instincts.
If someone talks down to you or rushes decisions, they’re not the right fit.

📌 Takeaway: Building a care team isn’t a luxury. It’s a lifeline.

📌 Next Steps

Check out our store: https://refuel.printify.me/ 

🧠 Tip:
Search “Area Agency on Aging + [Your County]” for free help building your team locally.

📢 Share this issue with a friend who’s just starting the caregiving journey. It might save them months of confusion and stress.

💙💙 Community is the new currency. 💙💙

You’re not alone in this—unless you try to be.
So build wisely. Ask boldly.
Let love be supported by structure.

Go be great. 🚀💙
Love you.

With faith & fuel,
Judith A. Culp
Founder, Faith + Gasoline