I stopped buying into the veneer of toxic positivity once I became the primary caregiver to my...
Category: Millennial Generation
Born between 1981 and 1996, millennials are likely to have young kids at home while caring for a partner, sibling(s), parent(s), and grandparent(s). We’re likely to be caring for someone who isn’t legally our family, limiting our access to support. We’re also likely to have our own health issues to manage while trying to build our careers.
My Parents Got Sick. It Changed How I Thought About My Marriage
In April of the pandemic, my mother was diagnosed with lung cancer. It was not an optimal moment...
Emma Dowling examines the mantras of self-care and what they tell us about our anxieties
As the care crisis intensifies, we are repeatedly urged to take care of ourselves. Ubiquitous,...
Don’t You Want Somebody to Take Care of You?
Gina became a caregiver at a young age. By age 6, she was emotionally responsible for her mother,...
We Needed More Significant Others
After multiple biopsies over many weeks (Scott said he felt as if he were an Ikea desk being...
The Health Insurance Plot Is the New American Happy Ending
The Health Insurance Plot is a cousin to the Marriage Plot, which refers to a story that concludes...
We need a queer and trans revolution in care for older adults
I’ve spent the past decade and a half feeling afraid of where I might end up living when I get...
On Alternative Forms of Communal Care and Expanded Kinship Circles
We need not look far to find cultures where caring kinships have been arranged differently....
What I wish I’d known
My 21-month caregiving ended a couple of months ago when my mother passed away. Since that time, I...
Living with My Mother’s Mental Illness
For my whole life I have lived in a family where transparency about my mother and her illness was...
My Mother Has Dementia. Here’s What I’ve Learned From Caring For Her For 8 Years.
I was 27 when I left my first full-time job to care for my mother when she was diagnosed with...
How we dealt with uncertainty and a virus
How we dealt with uncertainty, And a virus in our life, For fifteen years. And emerged as...
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...
I’m 25 and Taking Care of My Sick Dad. I’ve Never Felt Less Alone.
But unlike those who just moved home to wait out COVID-19, I’ve been home for the last two years....
Clocking In: ‘Would You Change My Mother’s Diaper for $10 an Hour?’
On a Tuesday in April, Michelle Walton woke up in Plantation, Florida, at eight. Her back hurt....
Clocking In: ‘Would You Change My Mother’s Diaper for $10 an Hour?’
On a Tuesday in April, Michelle Walton woke up in Plantation, Florida, at eight. Her back hurt....
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...
Isolation and ‘impossible choices’: When caregiving goes into lockdown
Even before the coronavirus, caregiving had become Sade Dozan’s every day. About a year and a half...
5 Things I Wish My Friends Knew About My Life as a Caregiver
It was 2003. I had just turned 16, and that was the summer my mom was diagnosed with ovarian...
What obligation do we owe our shitty fathers as they age?
They may have been monsters when we were growing up. But now they’re old, frail and not long for...
How to Help Comfort a Loved One During a Hospital Stay
Follow these tips to make their hospital stay as easy as possible.
How to Balance Parenting and Elderly Caregiving
My aunt’s decline took place over the course of about six weeks. We went from her visiting on...
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...