Help vs. Control

There are a lot of opinions of how to help someone when they need some help. Some will say you look at a situation and you do what in your wisdom needs to be done, others will say that you should ask the person in need of help and do only what they ask for, and many others will find a middle ground between those two ends of the spectrum. I remember my mom saying that she knew of a woman who was not able to vacuum her floors and when people offered to vacuum for her she said yes, and then instructed them that they must vacuum each area 5 times before going on to the next area of carpet. The question then asked is "are you helping if you only do it three times? Must you do it five times to be helpful? Is it appropriate to explain to her that, in your opinion, three times in enough to get all the dirt out"? Or do you just avoid doing this particular thing to help her so that there is no argument?

There have been a few times in my life when I have had to accept help. Twice I have been on bed rest and after the twins were born I had an emergency surgery. This gave us the opportunity to be helped by a lot of people. Some people brought in meals, others helped with taking care of the babies or older kids, a few friend even came over and did house cleaning. I learned pretty quickly that I had to be flexible about how they did things. I tried to also be open to suggestions they gave even if they went against my personal opinions. I found it was much easier for me to accept help from those who were open to direction or input. I found the help was also better for my family's benefit if those helping listened to my concerns and suggestions for effectiveness.

I have found when I am helping others that there are times that I am tempted to just jump in and do it my way, regardless of how they feel about it. I have learned that while this may be less work for me in the long run, or a safer route, that it breaks the trust and disrespects the person(s) you are trying to help. I remember at one point I was helping someone who was a hoarder. She kept everything. She also did not clean very much. Her house was not what most of us would have felt comfortable in. After I visited her in her home I would have to go home and take a shower and change clothes because the stench was so bad. When I was helping her do a "little cleaning" I asked her if I could throw certain things away (old newspapers, used litter boxes, empty food cans, etc) and she would inevitably say no. After some time I started throwing away items without asking anymore. I realized after the fact that I was making her decisions for her and that she would not be able to grow in the way she needed by me forcing this change. Unfortunately I realized that I had been caught up in controlling her instead of helping her like I had intended. There are other times that I have slipped into the controlling mode. It is something that with my children I have to be very careful of because it can come so easily in this relationship, but it will not help them learn what they need to.

I think that there is no right answer that will fit all possibilities when given the opportunity to help. Some guidelines I use in helping are these:

• Is it within my limitations?
• Will it bring comfort to the person I am serving?
• Is it what they are asking for?
• If I see an inconsistency between what they are asking and what appears to be needed, have I communicated that to them in a polite, respectful way?