Caregiving

In recent years the term caregiving has broadened from a term describing the care of children and infants to include care for the elderly, primarily by women. In fact, this is a second career for some middle-age adults. The following chart parallels the kinds of feelings, situations, and responses of the caregiver and the older family member, as well as ways to solve issues between them.

Adults who are providing care for aging parents need ministry. The following suggestions are useful in ministering to these families.

• Assist family members in understanding the physical and psychological aging process.
  
  
• Provide education opportunities for caregivers about legal issues, financial issues, living wills, emotional needs and responses, etc.
  
  
• Assist caregivers and older family members in enhancing communication among family members.
  
  
• Assist caregivers in the use of internal and external support systems.
  
  
• Assist caregivers in finding and using community resources.
  
  
• Provide counseling services, including support groups with the purpose of decreasing family problems and conflicts.

Poll your friends over 50. Because of better health care and improved medical care, many of them are dealing with aging parents. Adults are surviving to the age of decline. And because of radically changed social patterns, the once familiar choice of inviting mother to move in is less automatic and far less feasible. When these two generations attempt to join together, it's like joining two different time zones: elders are from Greenwich, and older boomers are from Pacific Standard Time.

"I'm a caregiver." The term doesn't ring with familiarity. We recognize the term and predictable routine behind the statement, "I'm a mother." The latter has status. The former implies a lower, accidental position. Caregiving is not highly valued in Western society. It does not create evidence that the effort has value when weighed against salary and prestige. In this century caregiving is changing precisely because there are more elderly who are living longer and because the number of potential caregivers is decreasing. This is caused in part because families are smaller than in an earlier era and because daughters, the usual caregivers, are involved in careers. Caregiving is generally and usually provided for those who are considered "ill," whereas mothering (another caregiving role) is usually with well persons. Who are the persons to whom caregivers extend concern? These are persons who are:

• Experiencing an acute illness
  
  
• Experiencing a chronic illness
  
  
• In pain
  
  
• Recovering from an acute illness or health accident—for example, a stroke
  
  
• Experiencing long-term disabilities

Who cares for these people in our contemporary society? Caregiving is a more pressing issue today for a number of reasons. First, more seniors need care. Second, the usual caregiver is a woman, and those women face a crisis of deciding how they will manage career and caregiving responsibilities at the same time. Generally women care for the elderly; men give money. Consequently, women face special challenges.

• Many women have to face the choice of caring for an aging parent or continuing their careers.
  
  
• Families are smaller, consequently fewer children can assist with caregiving responsibilities
  
  
• More and more women are single parents. They need assistance with caring for two generations simultaneously.

One family member usually becomes the primary caregiver and bears the brunt of caregiving responsibilities, while others occupy secondary roles for three reasons: choice, designation, or default. Why this design? Cultural values, even more than financial considerations, appear to be a major contributing factor when the decision is made to take care of mother. In working-class families the parents are the ones who often choose which of their children will become identified as the primary caregiver.

Despite these arrangements adults resist this designation. Caregivers in their 30s say, "I'm too young for this to be happening to me." Caregivers in middle age say, "I thought I'd be free at this time of my life. I wanted to enjoy retirement, maybe do a little traveling; my empty nest is being refilled." Older caregivers say, "I'm too old for this. I'm old myself." In fact, the number of grandchildren who are helping with two generations is on the rise. It is expected that this rate will increase given the population growth among the very old.

The caregiving task faced by many adults is intensively demanding. Caring for aging parents can be a joy, however, an opportunity to give back across the generations. Church leaders should be sensitive to the anguish of middle adults who are daily watching their parents deteriorate by the ravages of Alzheimer's disease or face lonely days in a nursing facility eight hundred miles away.

For further reading:

• Forward Together: A New Vision for Senior Adult Ministry by Jay Johnston (Nashville: LifeWay Church Resources)
  
  
• Ideas for Homebound Ministries by Malcolm Masler (Birmingham: Woman's Missionary Union)

AdultApplication: Every church has adults who are caring for aging parents. How can your church provide care for the caregiver? What can churches do to help middle adults with their aging parents? Interview some adults in this situation and ask them about their needs. They may have questions about processes for which others in the church can provide answers based on experience or knowledge—for example, getting power of attorney, transitioning all financial responsibilities from parent to child, finding a good long-term care facility, etc. Or they may just need encouragement or support. What can your church do to help?