The Memories Project

With my parents before my father moved into a memory care center.

The Wall Street Journal published an article recently about the beginning of an only child boom and its impact on caregiving. As an only child, I could relate all too well to the main subject of the article. I felt overwhelmed many times during my caregiving journey, and felt the crushing weight of making life or death medical decisions on my own.

On the other hand, every time I’ve mentioned the challenges of being an only child and caring for aging parents, I’ve heard from others who had siblings but still felt like only children because their siblings refused to help with caregiving duties for their parents. Or in other cases, siblings would squabble over making decisions in the care of their parents, leading to fractured relationships. So I understand how whether being a small or large family, caregiving comes with its challenges.

One of the people profiled in the article talked about having to make a life-or-death medical decision for their mother while being in another country several thousand miles away. In the comments section, someone inquired why distance would make the decision more difficult. I can speak personally to this, as I was 1,300 miles away when I got a call the morning of Black Friday, with a nurse in rapid-fire speak informing me my dad was crashing and should they engage in life-saving measures or not. The nurse had first tried to reach my mother, but she took sleeping pills and wore ear plugs when sleeping, so she didn’t answer the phone. Now the life and death decision was in my hands.

But it really wasn’t. Over 12 years later, I still struggle with the decision I was forced to make, which was tell the nurse to keep my father alive while I tried to reach my mother. If it had been solely up to me, I would have let my father go. But I couldn’t make that decision for my mother, and I knew she would never forgive me if I had. I eventually got hold of her and my father lived about another month before dying five days before Christmas.

One of the reasons I feel so strongly about paid leave is for those like myself who find all of the parental caregiving duties falling on their shoulders. No one should lose their job because they are caring for a loved one. It’s also why I feel so strongly about respite care, as only children may not have as robust of a support system that can come with larger families.

I enjoyed being an only child and don’t regret the lack of a larger family. But as the article mentions, only children need to be vigilant about building a support system so that when an older parent has a medical emergency, they will have resources in place to help them make informed decisions about medical care, finances, and to lean on for emotional support.