Living the Dream: the Sandwich Generation

It's not that I'm on a low carb diet, I just, for a minute, maybe would like to go without one of the crusts on my sandwich - for like, I don't know, a full week.


If you're over 40 and have kids, you know what I'm talking about. Addressing the needs of your aging parents, and your maturing children at the same time. Right now, as both my husband and I are in the financial services sector and managing to keep our jobs) our lives are like a crazy chicken salad in the middle - with my elderly (89 years old) Mother in Law as one of the crusts... and a whacky blended group of progeny, ranging in ages from 15 to 24 as the other.


About 8 years ago, I had a brief encounter with this reality when my fairly young (73 years old) mother went from healthy as a horse to very sick and died shortly after her diagnosis. It was 10 weeks total of going from complete independence to doing her shopping, then laundry, then housework, then making health care decisions with her, then for her, and then, well, managing her estate. With my kids being 7 years old at the time, and one of the daughters living in Chicago, they all were very forgiving and tolerant of my attention to her needs. And, my husband did a fabulous job of filling in the gaps.


Our current reality is that we recently helped Lila, my Mother in Law move from the family home of 40+years to a senior's apartment. She is very healthy, and we were happy to get her into a safe environment while she could enjoy the facility and the extra social activities the facility offers. Part of the move was not just furniture, but moving all of her utilities, banking, insurance, you know... the bills! Even before this, we did all of her grocery shopping, ran her errands, sometimes with her, and sometimes without her. Now, we have established a fairly routine pattern of how we provide this support. And now, she needs more. She wants us to manage more of her business affairs, as she doesn't understand all the mail she gets. She's still feeling isolated, and wants to "get out more". Her house needs to be updated, cleaned up and sold. I love Lila dearly, and I know that in addition to all we are doing for her now, she's looking for another 4 or 5 hours a week with us, minimum.


The other crust is a wonderful weave of our (Scott and my) children - My 15 year old twin boys who split their time between their dad's and my house, Scott's 24 year old daughter who is a grad student and lives at her mom's home Chicago, and Scott's 18 year old daughter who lives independently in a small town about an hour west of us. They all need different things from us as parents. Not too many years ago, it centered around broken bones and scraped knees, struggles with homework and relationships with teachers. Now, as they all make the transition to adults, they need more emotional support.


Not as easy as a shot of neosporin and a bandaid! As they start making decisions that heavily impact their later lives, we do our best to provide the right level of support - enough so that they know we are there, not so much that we stop them from learning about the choices they make, It's a fine balance, and each one has their own "flavor of support".


So we spend our days making a living, and supporting our extended family members and working to keep our relationship (marriage) alive. I now understand the lifestyle so well utilized by our ancestors - having family members live with or close by for a long time. It doesn't fit today's world, and trust me, I don't think we could handle everyone under the same roof!


I love all of the members of our not-so-extended family and treasure the time we have with them. It won't last forever.... so I guess I get both crusts for a while. Next time I'm at a sandwich shop I'll just order chicken salad on a lettuce leaf... and smile.