Weejun posted this under a different thread, and I moved it to its own. Good article. from Boston Globe columnist Ellen Goodman.
'Dependence days' loom for baby boomers"
BOSTON — This is probably not the best week to air any reservations about the American passion for independence. After all, we don't have fireworks for Dependence Day. We don't hold parades to celebrate Interdependence Day. We don't get a holiday for Connections.
Our allegiance to independence as a nation is Yankee doodle dandy. But I'm wondering whether our ode to independence as a people is a bit over the top. We foster an unrealistic view of the way we live, not just in the designated years of caring for our children but in the undesignated years when we care for our elders.
Maybe independence is too crisply defined as "exemption from reliance on, or control by, others; direction of one's own affairs without interference."
This comes to mind because here in Massachusetts we've have had five serious car accidents involving elders in the past month. An 86-year-old struck an elderly man in a crosswalk. A 93-year-old drove through the window of a Wal-Mart, injuring six people. An 89-year-old killed a 4-year-old child.
Yes, I know. An octogenarian may be no greater a menace on the highway than a 35-year-old texting while driving. But the spate of accidents predictably prompted a call to require regular testing of everyone over 85.
This in turn prompted one elder in a car-dependent suburb to lament, "It would ruin me. I'm so dependent on it. If I couldn't drive I'd have to be dependent on someone else."
Somewhere along the way we have to acknowledge that there are worse things than being dependent. And somewhere we have to wonder why we turn to legislation when we need conversation. Looking to the state to take the keys from dad is rather like outsourcing our children's sex education to the schools because we are too tongue-tied to talk about sex at home.
As a society, and as individuals, we are woefully unprepared for aging, even when it's our parents. We have 76 million baby boomers already entering their 60s. As one of them, Paula Span, says, "When my dad was my age both of his parents had died and he was retired. I'm never going to be able to retire and I might be caring for my dad when I'm in my 70s and he's in his 90s."
Span has written "When the Time Comes," a welcome "support group in print" for anyone with aging parents. She leads a compassionate and eyes-wide-open journey with families struggling to do the right thing from the car-key moment to hospice.
About 34 million Americans provide at least some of the care for frail, aging family members and yet we don't see it as a normal, predictable part of the life cycle. As Span says with amazement, "We prepare for everything. We prepare for education, for marriage. We read 40 books on pregnancy and childbirth. But we don't prepare for the idea that we'll spend years taking care of an older relative."
Instead, we retain what she calls "this hazy idea that we'll all be healthy for years and years and then just die." There is no best-seller called "What To Expect When They Are Declining." Nor is there any "Missing Manual" on what to do when our parents become too frail or confused to live alone. It always seems sudden when we get the call about the "accident" or the illness or the pot left on the stove.
The concern around the car keys is a symbol of the denial shared by parents and adult children. But it's also a template for talking about everything from assisted living to end-of-life care. These are the courageous conversations to initiate before "the time comes." "Immortality is not on the menu," urges Span, "so let's dispense with that and talk about what's going to happen."
What inhibits us is not just the parent/child relationship but the belief that there is something shameful, improper and infantilizing about "help."
Our parents raised us to be independent. We raise our children under the same rubric. What we left out is the lesson that care-giving continues through the life cycle. Needing help is not role reversal but joint responsibility. We are bound to break through this reticence when the 76 million boomers start hitting 75.
But all this is hitting this generation as adult children, a phrase that is no longer an oxymoron.
Driving is not all that's driving this. Sooner, not later, our country has to pass a reality road test on independence.
Posted this article because if we haven't already done so, we need to be having discussions among ourselves and with our family members so everybody knows everybody elses wishes. Even young people need to think about what they want should they find themselves incapacitated -- thankfully it does not happen often, but sometimes it does. I've been working on a letter to our three sons to give them written instructions so that if (I hope I don't) I throw a fit when the time comes to place me, they will have it in writing that in my "sane" moments it was what I wanted.
I've actually given my three kids a list of who to notify in case of death. Listed insurance, funeral home, relatives, religious affiliates, home owners' assoc and so on.
Good work, bluedaze, but have you told them what to do if you get dementia and/or become a hazard to others or yourself or otherwise are unable to care for yourself...
I also have had the "talk" with my adult children. It is a talk that I feel that is just as important as the birds and bees talk when they were teenagers. I have left written instructions regarding finances, final wishes, life insurance etc. but I also told them when we were all together on Mother's Day and we spent most of the day getting Charlie out of first one thing and then another, that when or if I ever get like that, place me immediately. Do not put yourself through the hell of care giving. It serves no useful purpose except maybe to ease guilt and make you old before your time.
Our kids know we both have living wills and where our cemetary lots are. They also have copies of our wills and living wills, but we haven't had the talk about finances, insurance, dependant care, etc. - need to do that. I agree 100% with bluedaze....I don't want my kids changing my diapers!
Ellen Goodman is one of the best editorialist that I have read. Our local paper carries her occasionally and I have never read anything she has written that I can't agree with. After having gone through filing for medicaid for my Mom, my parents are now set for their funeral plan (after many days of difficult talks) and have their living wills and wills in place. We have done all the legal bookeeping to get their property set for them and my 3 siblings are all aware of their wishes. They fought us tooth and nail (where did this saying come from?) about "taking care of business" and about getting Mom the care she needed in a nh. I feel very badly that Dad is at home dealing with cancer and chemo and she is in a nh with her full faculties (just has physical disabilities) and they are very needy of each others support (emotionally). I wish they could be together in this time of their greatest challenges but, that is not the hand that was dealt them. I have my own trust set up and my daughter nows what I want. She knows where everything is and what to do "in case". I also don't want my daughter changing my diapers but I am not certain she would!! She always kids me and says" the minute you need changing, off to a nh you go!" I hope I take alot of pills before this happens. After seeing my dh, I know I don't want to live out my days waiting for someone to visit me or care for me so thoroughly. I don't think that God really intended it to be this way. I've survived breast cancer and a melanoma and ad. I want my life back to do totally worthless things anytime I want to. (Sorry, I am getting carried away). I don't want to care for any more parents and husbands. Dependence day is here for me and has been for quit a few years . I guess I need a vacation.
Kathryn0907, I know exactly how you feel. I've been taking care of people since I was 20 -- children, my in-laws, my parents (father AD), one child through a serious injury, now DH. I'm tired of dependence day(s) and look forward to MY TIME. +
let me tell all that the task of putting my DW in the assisted living facility was hard BUT it made it a lot easyer in that we had discussed this many times together and with our two daudhters Both of us made it clear that this is what we want done if that time ever came . So the night that she fell in the bath room and I could not hear due to the fact that I am deaf with out my implant . I knew the time had come . The next week we did it . It has been 4 weeks now and she still crys and I do also But she has to stay . It is getting better as they adjust her meds .
I sent the article to my children and a few friends, because I thought Ellen Goodman did an exception job in writing this column. Only one (a friend) replied...and he didn't "get it" at all. His statement was "I'm lucky because my mom is still active, even though she is 85." It wasn't about US moms, it's about all of them,... Second column idea, Ms. Goodman.."Baby Boomers Who Cannot Read For Comprehension!"
NancyB--The friend who replied is in for a rude awakening when his Mom, at 85, becomes ill or takes a fall-- and it can happen to anyone. Keep a copy to re-send to him later, if you think he'll appreciate then.
What I gleaned from her article is that most of the Baby Boomers have given no thought whatsoever to their own aging process. They are not setting examples for their own children to follow when it comes to caring for their parents or others. I call it the "ME" generation. and...look at the values of their children! Scary.