Helping Our Ageing Parents

 We watch our parents grow older. The elderly parent is dealing with their own fears losing their ability to take care of their life. One is paranoid about others wanting his money, the other is easily confused. We wonder as adult children how much longer they'll be able to live on their own.

 Many adult children are dealing with parents growing older and frail and with all the complications that go with aging. First come the practical problems, then the emotional complexities, the feelings that arise as a result of seeing our parents age, dealing with them as they age, and dealing with siblings and other family members around parental issues. 

 We want our brothers and sisters to be equal caregivers. The sad reality is that all siblings don't give equally, which can create much tension in a family. Old rivalries can play out at the expense of parents. When siblings cannot set aside their differences for the purpose of accomplishing specific goals, they will be unable to work together, leaving others to carry out their responsibilities for their parents.

 Then there's the reality that we want to care for both our children and our parents.  It's a lovely sentiment but a daunting task.  The fact is that the so-called Sandwich Generation is a family with children and two working parents and one or two aging parents.  It's increasingly more common that at least one of the adult children will have an aging parent who is in need of some help. Who's going to take Mom to the doctor, Dad to physical therapy, and the kids to soccer practice? As a result of this pressure, the adult children can feel stressed, anxious, or depressed.

 These responsibilities of care, are frequently unexpected and unwanted, often create problems for those who must shoulder them - from tensions with siblings about who provides care to feelings of anger about past hurts, to the arousal of guilt about not doing enough for parents to differences with a spouse about the distribution of responsibilities in the larger family.