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Sibling Family Caregiving · Let's Ask the Mamas!

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: We got a question for American mamas. Der mama is
• 0:02
  Speaker 1: how do you handle the problem of one sibling not
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: helping out with the caregiving of a parent and the
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: rest of the family is well, let's ask our American
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  Speaker 1: mama's Mama. Mama joining us now our American mama's Turnoutville
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: and Kimberly Burlason. You know, some some people live really
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: far away from their parents and their brother is stepping
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  Speaker 1: up and he's helping dad out with you know, Parkinson's
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: exercises and stuff like that, and brother's doing a very
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: good job. And the other brother has a radio show
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  Speaker 1: and he lives a state away and he just can't
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: always get there.
• 0:45
  Speaker 2: Distance makes it easy to confuse checking in with showing up. Ah, Okay,
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  Speaker 2: that's a biggie. This is happening a lot. We have
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  Speaker 2: a lot of friends, and I think because we're getting
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  Speaker 2: older when our fifty, so a lot of our friends
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  Speaker 2: are in this situation where they're caregiving. But they're right,
• 0:59
  Speaker 2: you're the between age, the in between right now, get started.
• 1:03
  Speaker 2: You are getting older, and nine times out of ten,
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  Speaker 2: it's a daughter. It's a girl that's taking care of
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  Speaker 2: the parent and the kids either don't live close, or
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  Speaker 2: they decide to distance themselves. But I've seen it play
• 1:19
  Speaker 2: out in several even my husband's family with his mother
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  Speaker 2: who recently passed, and our neighbors and one of my
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  Speaker 2: best friends. They're in the midst of this. And my
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  Speaker 2: best friend I was talking to her about it. She's
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  Speaker 2: got several siblings, but her mother lives with her. She
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  Speaker 2: takes care of her. She takes her to the pharmacy,
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  Speaker 2: she takes her to a doctor's appointment, she feeds her,
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  Speaker 2: she does everything. But she said, I always I also
• 1:41
  Speaker 2: get the worst of my mom. I get her frustration,
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  Speaker 2: I get her anger. And when my siblings check in,
• 1:48
  Speaker 2: everything's great, everything's wonderful, everything's because she doesn't like sharing
• 1:51
  Speaker 2: with them the problems. And she said, my siblings will
• 1:55
  Speaker 2: call and they'll say, how can I help you, And
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  Speaker 2: She's like, I don't know, but I need help. I
• 2:01
  Speaker 2: need a break. They've got their lives, they're living their lives,
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  Speaker 2: and I don't. I'm I'm trapped and I love my
• 2:07
  Speaker 2: mom and I should feel grateful. And she said, Kimberly,
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  Speaker 2: you lost your mom, and I feel horrible saying this
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  Speaker 2: because you don't have your mom. They always say that,
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  Speaker 2: Like everybody I know that's in the situation says that,
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  Speaker 2: and I'm like, no, this is a real thing. This
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  Speaker 2: is we didn't have that, right. I feel we were
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  Speaker 2: blessed because we didn't have that.
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  Speaker 1: I mean, your mom passed fairly.
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  Speaker 2: Quickly, as devastating as it was, we never had to
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  Speaker 2: deal with this caretaking the long term.
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: Yes, yes, you know folks dealing with Alzheimer's and you know,
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  Speaker 1: especially you know, if you're dealing with dementia and you're
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  Speaker 1: dealing with parents who may not even remember who.
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  Speaker 2: You are exactly, they get frustrated because.
• 2:41
  Speaker 1: They can't remember anything, and then they can't even express it. Yeah,
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: I mean that is a very very difficult thing to go.
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  Speaker 2: I feel like it fragments families. I think it's very
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  Speaker 2: hard to be in that situation as a child and
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  Speaker 2: a parent. It's you become the parent and you feel
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  Speaker 2: resentful of your siblings for not helping, and it kind
• 3:00
  Speaker 2: of breaks the family a little bit.
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  Speaker 3: And I wonder, because you said that, she said, when
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  Speaker 3: the siblings say what can we do, She's like, I
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  Speaker 3: don't know. I guess it goes back to any time
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  Speaker 3: you need something, I just need you to come. Why
• 3:12
  Speaker 3: don't you say I'll be I'm taking a week off,
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  Speaker 3: I'm gonna come. You just take it easy for a week,
• 3:16
  Speaker 3: even a week would give them a breath. But like
• 3:19
  Speaker 3: we have Kevin's mom, my husband's mom, she's still living
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  Speaker 3: in her home. She's independent, but she needs help. Lisa,
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  Speaker 3: my sister in law, is there and she and her
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  Speaker 3: husband do the brunt of like the yard work, the shop,
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  Speaker 3: grocery shopping and all of that. And we are so
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  Speaker 3: grateful and well, will help pay for things. And that's
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  Speaker 3: the easy that's the easy part, right, We'll send you
• 3:39
  Speaker 3: a little bit of money. But in somebody, some people
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  Speaker 3: might say, well, you know that your mother in law's
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  Speaker 3: probably given her some of the inheritance. And I say,
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  Speaker 3: good good, I don't care. She's doing everything over there.
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  Speaker 3: So if you have that mindset of not you know.
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  Speaker 3: And Lisa never makes us feel guilty. But again she's
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  Speaker 3: independent living so she only has to go there and
• 4:00
  Speaker 3: on her and she's not caretaking in the home. I
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  Speaker 3: know that is exhausting for a lot of elderly children
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  Speaker 3: like our age, who are also trying to take care
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  Speaker 3: of our grand babies and out all the things that's
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  Speaker 3: a hard one, and.
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  Speaker 1: It's resentment is a trap. I'm not saying the resentment
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  Speaker 1: is not real. I'm saying you can get stuck in it,
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  Speaker 1: and it's we talk in church about how it's about
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  Speaker 1: unmet expectations, Like if you're expecting people to do something
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  Speaker 1: and they don't, then you can get stuck in a fence.
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  Speaker 1: You can get stuck in resentment, and then that can
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  Speaker 1: start to eat away at you.
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  Speaker 3: So if you wallow in it, there we go.
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  Speaker 1: Then not that not that you aren't justifying feeling that way,
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  Speaker 1: but how long do you want to wait in that?
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  Speaker 1: Because that can be that could become very, very difficult.
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  Speaker 2: I've often thought about what we we would have done
• 5:00
  Speaker 2: as sisters if Mom was in that situation and there
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  Speaker 2: was no resentment. There wouldn't be because we're so vocal
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  Speaker 2: right with our frustrations communication, with our communication, there would
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  Speaker 2: be you know, Terry, you're coming, You're coming here to
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  Speaker 2: help us do this or you know. So I think
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  Speaker 2: that that's a key to just that open communication, being
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  Speaker 2: able to talk to each other and not hanging on
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  Speaker 2: harboring that resentment.
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  Speaker 1: And if you guys, you guys, because you're so open
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  Speaker 1: there's not like a whole bunch of stuff left from
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  Speaker 1: childhood that you haven't like delta that zero, you know
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  Speaker 1: what I mean. But in a lot of families, are
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  Speaker 1: it true? And so some of what you're resentful for
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  Speaker 1: now may actually be something that you were resentful for
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  Speaker 1: at seven.
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  Speaker 2: Never even thought about that.
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  Speaker 3: But I think because we were such a communicative family,
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  Speaker 3: everything was out there and some people are like, oh
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  Speaker 3: my gosh, can't believe you just said that your sister
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  Speaker 3: and the next minute we're like laughing and they don't understand.
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  Speaker 3: But you're right. I think communication and were women.
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  Speaker 1: So if you like, if you like mom is a
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: question to got our website at Americanground raadyo dot com,
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: slash momas a. Click on the ask the MoMA's bladon
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: Jared Edile, Kimberly Real listen, thank you so much, Thank you,