Left at the Door: The Burden of Caregiving During COVID
- maryrburrell
- Jun 11
- 3 min read
How Pandemic Policy Redefined the Role of Family Caregivers
I want to talk about a group of people who rarely get the spotlight but absolutely deserve it.
Caregivers.Especially those who stood by us through the chaos and fear of COVID-19.
When I was going through my hospice journey with heart valve disease, it wasn’t just the disease that made things heavy it was the timing.
Hospitals were locked down.
Visitors were banned.
People were isolated.
And fear was everywhere.
But even in all that, there were people caregivers — quietly holding everything together.
You Weren’t Allowed In… But You Never Left
I remember the way my daughter or son would drop me off at the hospital doors, not even allowed to come inside.
During the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, hospitals across the country enforced strict no-visitor policies, even for patients facing serious illness or undergoing major treatment. It was a necessary step to limit exposure, but it created an unfamiliar and painful kind of separation, one that touched every patient and every caregiver.
That moment remains one of the loneliest and heaviest I’ve ever known.
Walking through those doors without my family, knowing they couldn’t follow, was hospital policy designed to keep us safe. But to us, it felt like abandonment from the rituals of care we had always counted on, waiting rooms, hand-holding, bedside presence, shared updates from a doctor’s mouth, not a phone.
Yes, the nurses and doctors were kind, thoughtful, and as communicative as they could be. They did their best and we were grateful. But still, the absence lingered.
Not being able to sit at the bedside, to read my face, to advocate in real time and it left a weight on all of us.
I know my children tried to stay strong, to be calm, to trust the process. But I also know it tore at them.
Being told to wait, to trust, to hope from a parking lot, or behind a mask, or through a screen that isn’t what love is supposed to look like.
And yet, somehow, that’s exactly what love looked like during those long, uncertain days.
Caregiving during COVID meant showing up without being allowed in.
It meant:
Holding your breath every time the phone rang
Crying alone in the car
Pacing in a parking lot
Sitting by your phone all night
Being the strong one, even when you were falling apart inside
No one brought you casseroles.No one asked how you were doing.No one saw your pain because all the attention was (understandably) on the patient.
But Let Me Say This:
You mattered then. You matter now.
Your stress, your sleepless nights, your steady presence in a world that felt upside down that was courage, even if it didn’t look like it.
There was no time to break down. No room to catch your breath.
And yet you kept showing up.
This Is Your Thank You
Maybe no one said thank you.Maybe they still haven’t.But I will.
Thank you…
For being brave with your fear, so I could breathe through mine.
For holding on when everything felt overwhelming
For being my strength when I had none left
To anyone who was a caregiver during COVID whether for heart disease, cancer, or chronic illness, I see you.
💬 Let’s Talk
If this story resonates with you as a caregiver, a patient, or someone who waited outside those doors, I’d love to hear your story. Share your experience in the comments or pass this on to someone who might need it. Let's honor the quiet, unseen care that carried us through.
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