What Do You Do When Your Parents Live Forever?
The Guardian had a great story last week, “When Your Parents Live Forever“. Between them, Dan and Lavinia Cohn-Sherbok have cared for three parents in their nineties.
It’s a very realistic, and, down to earth account of caring for parents who have lived to extreme old age:
Yet, for all our blessings, we have one deep, dark preoccupation. We never expected it, and we certainly never prepared for it. What has become perhaps the most difficult and disturbing experience of our late middle-age has nothing to do with our earlier concerns. We are, for the first time, confronted with the problem of very elderly parents. “Old People” who for many years now have shown every sign of living for ever.
While they are very grateful to have the ability to care for them, there are some serious consequences to having parents live to an extreme old age.
They share 10 Commandments they came up with based on what they’ve learned:
And after 10 years of wrestling with the complexities of looking after the elderly, we have devised 10 commandments that have helped us. They are not easy to live up to, but we offer them in the hope that they may help others in a similar situation:
1. Respect your parents’ independence as long as you can. This means finding solutions that allow the old people to be themselves and to preserve as much of their old life as is practical.
2. Try not to quarrel with your siblings. Ultimately, they are your only allies.
3. Try not to feel guilty. Whatever you do will never be enough.
4. Do not depend on a future inheritance. However affluent your parents may be, the cost of geriatric care is phenomenal and it is less than prudent to count on anything.
5. Try to establish a good relationship with your parents’ carers. A good carer should be priced above rubies. And remember, even a mediocre carer is better than no one at all.
6. Try to be guided by your sense of duty. On days when everything goes wrong, the notion of duty can be very helpful.
7. Try to be realistic about your own feelings. Whatever the books say, you will not always feel you “want to do your best for Mum and Dad”. There will be times when you will feel very angry indeed with them. You will be more in control of your feelings if you are honest about them.
8. Try to be patient with disabilities. Old age is difficult. It is not pleasant to be blind or deaf or lame. And it certainly does not make things easier when the old person refuses to wear her hearing aid or spectacles. Nonetheless, it is a stage of life that many of us will come to, and we would want people to be patient.
9. Try to forgive the past. Perhaps this is the hardest of all.
10. Accept that you cannot do more than your best. Those of us who look after elderly patients all feel inadequate. We all fall short. We are all exhausted. But at least we have some consolation if we have done our best.
They’ve also written a book on the same topic, What Do You Do When Your Parents Live Forever?
As modern medicine progresses, life expectancy increases, and, more and more people will be facing the care of those who have lived to extreme old age.
While the experience is different for everyone, it’s refreshing to see people admit that they have mixed feelings about it all. Even in the best of situations, care giving is hard.
(Via Kate at Babylune)
Tags: Aging, Dan-and-Lavinia-Cohn-Sherbok, extreme-old-age, sandwich-generation, What-Do-You-Do-When-Your-Parents-Live-ForeverRelated Stories
POSTED IN: Aging Parents
7 opinions for What Do You Do When Your Parents Live Forever?
Susan
Mar 26, 2007 at 10:29 am
Elizabeth, thank you for this. It is a very helpful list to keep in mind. I don’t know if my mother is yet in the “forever” category (she is 84) but these things are still very important to keep in mind. In fact, reading it made me a bit teary.
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Mar 26, 2007 at 3:51 pm
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Lori
Mar 29, 2007 at 6:13 pm
Hi Elizabeth,
Thanks for posting this thought-provoking blog. The women in my family tend to live well into their nineties; as for the men—well, that’s another story. My grandmother is in her late seventies and she’s extremely active. In fact, I think she probably has more stamina than my mother! I can only hope she’ll stay this active into her eighties and nineties, too.
Ever since I started working for Gilbert Guide (a long-term care resource), I’ve been thinking a lot about what it’s like to be a senior. I’m far more aware than I was before; I always give up my seat on the subway, I offer to carry a senior’s grocery bags if I see someone struggling. In general, I have a much stronger empathy for the challenges of being older. I’m also aware, though, that no one likes to be pitied or looked at as challenged. I was glad to see the number one commandment is respecting one’s parents’ independence. When I’m in my nineties—and if my family’s history is any indication, I’ll make it there—I want to be as close to the young “me” as I possibly can—a lot wiser and perhaps a little more fragile, but still adventurous and too plucky for my own good.
Lori
http://www.GilbertGuide.com
Kerri
Apr 1, 2007 at 5:12 pm
I think those commandments translate well for the care of an ailing parent, too, regardless of age.
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Vicki
May 24, 2007 at 8:02 pm
Thank you SO much for sharing this list. It’s just what I needed to read tonight. My father is almost 90 — had his second hip replacement only 8 weeks ago and is back to riding his lawn mower and doing laundry (which means going up and down basement stairs) and what I fear most, is now talking about driving again. My mother has mixed dementia and her arthritis makes it extremely difficult for her to get around. He is VERY stubborn and thinks he knows it all. I’ve been with them through ALL of this — some days being at their house 3x a day — and I still have a job and a husband and 3 grandsons I would love to spend more time with! Any thoughts on how to communicate my concerns about his driving with him would be appreciated!
Nikki Jong
May 29, 2007 at 12:10 pm
Vicki,
I attended a conference sponsored by the Alzheimer’s Association several months ago, and they had some great tips on talking to elderly loved ones about driving. You say your dad is stubborn, which makes an already difficult conversation harder. I encourage you to visit http://www.seniordrivers.org and read the post about senior driving at http://www.gilbertguide.com.
Also, one of the recommendations from the Alzheimer’s Association that I thought was pretty clever: if, after all reason fails, disable your father’s car temporarily. Ask a mechanic how you can do this safely. It’s better to be safe than sorry! Good luck with the conversation.
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