PARADE Magazine’s Resources for Caregivers

With this week’s issue, PARADE joins other national media outlets (NBC News, Newsweek, Consumer Reports, to name just a few) that have spotlighted home caregiving and the needs of aging parents over the last couple of years.

Well-known author and lecturer Gail Sheehy tells the story of caring for her husband during his battle with cancer. She goes on to remind us of the coming home caregiver crisis as more and more Boomers retire and begin looking to their children for care and support.

You might also check out the article “What Caregivers Need to Know” and the comments that accompany it. The comments provide a pertinent reminder that when we say “caregiver” we are referring to a broad range of people whose situations vary widely. There is a huge difference, for example, between end-of-life care and the sort of long-term care that can go on for years or decades.

I’m glad to see these issues begin to get the attention they deserve. When we first became caregivers 11 years ago, my wife and I hadn’t really thought about it much at all. We had to learn what to do and how to do it while we were doing it. We made needless mistakes and we felt isolated. We found ourselves feeling as if no one had ever worked through these things before. We later saw that we were following a well-traveled road. It would have helped a lot to have known that from the start.

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