People typically feel the need to be there for their aging parents — including Stella. But that pushes her more and more to her limits. How can she live up to them without overtaxing herself?
Dear Ms Peirano,
I am a teacher, 45, have two children (10 and 7 years old) and am married. The problem is my parents, who are quite old and now in need of care. My father (81) had a stroke in 2018 and is severely disabled. My mother has always been a little resilient. She has back problems, severe pain and is hard of hearing.
We live in Berlin, my parents near Dresden. I have a brother who lives in the US and stays out of everything.
Five years ago, my parents were still in a good position to master their own lives. Since then, they have been steadily declining, and the pandemic has certainly contributed to this. My parents call me every two to three days if I don’t call back right away, and they have a reproachful undertone.
I go to my parents’ house every second or third weekend, do the shopping, go for walks with my father, which is physically very demanding for me. He’s also very slow and I’m rather fast, which also pushes my patience to the limit, if I’m honest.
My parents refuse to seek professional help. They don’t want strangers in the house. And they don’t want to move out, they want to stay in their house. It is a fairly large house, in need of renovation, with a large garden. My mother tries harder than she can to keep the garden and the house in order herself. But when extra work needs to be done, my husband and I sometimes spend the whole weekend helping out.
I realize that the situation overwhelms me. I’m tense myself, often have back pain and can’t sleep at night. My husband and I often get at each other’s hair, and the children also whine when we go to the grandparents’ for a whole weekend and take them with us.
But I feel a great deal of guilt when I imagine refusing to help my parents. I don’t know how that goes down in my family (great aunts, aunts, etc.) if I don’t help my parents as much anymore. This conflict tears me apart.
Do you have any advice for me?
Many greetings
Stella G
Dear Stella G,
it sounds like you’re asking yourself a lot. What did you learn from your parents about stress limits when you were a child? Do your parents possibly have a past (due to war, expulsion, post-war period) in which they had to make extreme efforts to survive? I often hear that from people in your parents’ generation, that you and your parents lost everything in the war and had to start a new life from scratch. Hard work and perseverance often served to keep fears at bay. All of this made sense at the time and deserves to be appreciated. But today it looks different.
Parents with such patterns have often brought their own children up to the principle of performance and weaned them away from the principle of feeling. For example: A child comes home from school exhausted and needs to rest. The parents ask him why he wants to lie around lazily and encourage him to do his homework. Pain is ignored or denied.
Take a closer look at your own learned patterns.
My second question is what expectations and demands you perceive of your parents in relation to the care and support of the parents. What do you think your father/mother would say specifically if they were honest and open about how they want you to care for them? And how is that compatible with your feeling principle?
Once you have identified your parents’ expectations, ask yourself if you will expect the same care and devotion from your own children when you and your husband grow old and in need of care.
I often see people say, “But it’s my parents, I have to take care of myself” and in the same breath say, “I would NEVER expect my children to take care of me like that because I don’t want to burden her.”
There we have cognitive dissonance – two conflicting beliefs in your head. Write an essay for yourself about what YOU think is right about caring for your parents.
Perhaps the book “Why We Don’t Owe Our Parents Nothing” by Barbara Bleisch will help at this point.
The next point is what we therapists call “clarification of the assignment”. That means finding out what the other person wants from you. Some patients would secretly answer the question with: “Whine, drink tea and tell why the world is so bad for you”. So I ask specifically about the goals and specifically about the kind of help they need from me. And if that fits, therapy begins. If you want to drink tea and whine, you are welcome to try elsewhere.
With my children, too, I often thought about clarifying the assignment. Sometimes a child would want me to be an always-available taxi, to provide protein-rich, delicious food at any time of the day or night without a murmur, to accept that one day they’re like little children and shirk all responsibility and the next moment mommy notes for unlimited nightclub visits.
The role didn’t suit me, and I did my Offer listed: For example, instructing on social behavior and household chores, on binding agreements regarding eating together, and on respect for others.
As you can imagine, this hasn’t always made me popular, but I’ve stayed true to my values and my boundaries.
Just think about what tasks you have in your portfolio as a daughter (e.g. calling twice a week, taking on organizational tasks) and which ones you don’t.
Your parents are asking a lot of you, insisting on staying in their own home and not accepting outside help. But if you are dependent on other people – and that’s what your parents are of you – you have to submit to the rules of the game set by the people you depend on. If I want to have Hartz IV, I have to show to the office and, if necessary, job interviews, if I want my studies to be financed by my parents, I have to do certificates, etc.
It will certainly be a tough time for your parents, but you can also delegate certain practical services, such as a cleaner, a garden assistant, a supermarket with delivery service, etc. And above all, a nursing service that comes every day!
Think about which work is appropriate for a daughter (in my opinion, personal discussions and organizational help) and which you cannot or do not want to take on given your situation as a working mother of very small children. You must also be allowed to say: I don’t WANT to do that.
What is it with your brother that he is avoiding responsibility? Is there a valid reason for this or can it be involved financially or organizationally? As far as I know, there is also a telephone network in the USA, so that he can also call his parents regularly.
And the more you achieve, the less your parents and brother get the idea that something needs to change. It only works if you make your limits clear. You can consider how much time you invest if you want to feel good. Your parents could also move closer to you or go to a nursing home. It’s their choice not to do that.
Support in the form of coaching or therapy would certainly do you good to balance your limits. But please consider that there is a risk of burnout or even serious marital conflicts if you overwhelm yourself in the long term. And the situation has no foreseeable end.
Best regards
Juliet Peirano