Who will be your caregiver if and when you need one?

Baby Boomer Caregiver
AP Photo/Annie Rice

This is a question I think about from time to time.  I have one married daughter.  Her mother-in-law (mom of three) and I are both divorced, so we will be aging alone in our homes.  Our siblings do not live in our state.  Health care and financial support are already issues for both of us.  When I read the following article I couldn’t help but think of those of us who are solo seniors…

As Baby Boomers Move Into Old Age, Who Will Care For Us?

by Jody Gastfriend, Forbes.com

August 10, 2018

“My high school buddies and I recently got together and reminisced about old times. “Can you believe we’re 60?” we howled. “That used to seem really old!” Many of us are still caring for parents who have crossed the 90-year-old threshold. As we joked about our aging bodies—the creaky knees and achy joints—we mused about another topic too. Who will care for us as we grow old? Will our adult children with their busy lives assume the role of caregiver? And will the childless among us rely on nieces, nephews, friends or neighbors to step in?

When it comes to the growing demand for caregiving, the numbers just don’t add up. The United States, like many industrialized countries, is looking down the barrel of a looming care gap. As my fellow Baby Boomers move headlong into old age — we are now retiring at a rate of about 10,000 per day — there may not be enough caregivers to go around. The potential pool of family caregivers, whose stories I tell in my book, My Parent’s Keeper, will not sustain the growing demand for care. An estimated 117 million Americans will need assistance of some kind by 2020, yet the number of unpaid caregivers is expected to reach only 45 million. The caregiver support ratio, the number of potential family caregivers relative to the number of older Americans, is projected to decline sharply by mid-century.

Where have all the caregivers gone?”   Read more

Caregivers having the guts to do so, find a balance

How Do We Balance Autonomy and Risk for Older Adults?

Finding that balance takes guts, as caregivers often learn

“Georgia Dyson of St. Paul, Minn., died in March after suffering the gradual shrinkage of her world. Through it all, ‘she always relished her independence,’ her daughter Christine Dyson Dahn said.

Over Dyson’s 84 years, her spine twisted in two directions from degenerative scoliosis. She had cataracts, high blood pressure and congestive heart failure. She endured a double bypass heart operation, a mitral valve repair, a pacemaker, two hip replacements, a catheter, a hearing aid, dentures and, as you can imagine, periodic depression.

caregivers
Linda Irgens has advocated for more independence, even though it brings risk for her father, Richard “Papa Dick” Irgens. (Photo by D. Browning)

Despite all of that — and despite some misgivings about Dyson’s safety — family members did whatever they could to support her, insisting at each crossroads that she be allowed to get back to her routines.

‘We wanted to respect that fire in her, but we worried about her,’ Dahn said. ‘What if she went out in her wheelchair and got hit by a car?’