When Nonna’s memory fails her, she returns to familiar gestures. On a weekend afternoon in winter...
Category: Caring for a Grandparent
Wash
She showers once a week, and for the next six weeks—approximately four months into our new...
Queer Millennials Are Becoming Family Caregivers. We Aren’t Ready
The ache of watching a loved one grow smaller was hard enough. But I also wasn’t prepared for the...
America isn’t taking care of caregivers
Dementia had not robbed Lillian of her fiercely independent spirit, but it had made her verbally...
Don’t Let a Loved One’s Health Problems Come Between You
I’ve seen people with difficult-to-manage physical and mental health conditions (or hard-to-break...
The Crisis in Home Care
Kara Ward started her life as a caregiver earlier than most people do. She was only 29 when her...
The Story Of Britney Spears Is A Story Of Disability Rights
A conservatorship — often called a guardianship — puts a court-mandated guardian in charge of...
‘We Are Going to Keep You Safe, Even if It Kills Your Spirit’
In other care facilities and in hospitals, too, “wanderers” with dementia are believed to have...
Making the Mental Load Visible
Too often we compartmentalize our caregiving — childcare, aged care, sick care, disabled care. Yet...
Stolen Years: Learning How to Fight Lewy Body Dementia
A month before my grandfather William passed away, I sat beside him in the hospital, pushing a...
Aging in Place
About three weeks ago, my extended family extracted Louise from her assisted living facility in...
To My Mother in Law Who I Feel Should Help Take Care of Her Own Mother
An open letter to my mother in law about what it's truly like taking care of her mother. Where...
Creating a Plan: Caregiving for Loved Ones During COVID-19
If you’re a caregiver that’s creating a backup plan, take a look at these key points.
Should You Bring Mom Home From Assisted Living During The Pandemic?
With the coronavirus moving through facilities that house older adults, families across the...
Delivering Food To Seniors Is Only Half The Battle, The Need For Help Is Overwhelming
Receiving phone calls from elderly clients who just want to talk is not unusual for...
Keeping Older People Safe During the Coronavirus Crisis
In the United States today, there are approximately four million older adults who are not in...
How to get siblings to step up and help
So often the duties of caregiving fall on a single family member, even when there are other people...
The Caregiver’s Encyclopedia
I'd just finished Muriel Gillick's Old and Sick in America, an eye-opening 'narrative tour' of the...
Familism is Making our Latinx Caregivers Sick
The tradition of keeping everything in the family is an amiable labor of love, but it is making...
The unequal financial burden for Black caregivers
Carlo St. Juste Jr. is on his way to bring his mother to a hospital appointment when he takes...
She Is 96 and Does Not Fear Her Death. But Do Her Children?
It is one of the most vexing chapters of old age: how to navigate not just the inevitable ending,...
Tough conversations are the best conversations
Earlier this year, my grandmother was diagnosed with stage four ovarian cancer and was told she...
Does life ever get easier?
Sometimes it's just one thing after another, for months and then years. How do you make it...
Love and Lapses
It's hard to change roles after living a certain way for decades. Dementia -- and aging in general...