This week, I have been staying with my parents. My mother seemed to need me to come desperately. We live a few states away from each other, a full day flying. I find that I come now about every three months. I am not really sure what I can offer, though. I have no medical expertise. I suspect my primary role is to act as confidant for both of my parents, neither of whom has very many people to talk to. We talk about my mother’s health and very little else. It’s wearing on me already. I can’t imagine what it is like for them.

I don’t anticipate that I will ever be able to reduce the length of time between my visits. Already, this visit is twice as long as my last. According to my mother, who wants me to move in next door, it is never long enough.

I brought out my laptop this week, anticipating being able to get some work done. I told my mother very explicitly the other night that I just needed three hours of uninterrupted work time the next day in order to finish two projects, and then to be finished with with my big work stuff during my visit. My work was constantly interrupted. I had to go to the basement to work. It was still interrupted. It took me twice as long as it should have to finish one project. The other one is simply untouched. Still. When I am working at home, around my kids, I can usually work for a few hours after the kids go to bed. I have been unprepared for how unable I am to work after my parents go to bed. I have another project that needs to be done. I have understanding clients, but I still need to do it. But right now, what I need even more, is to go have dinner with three of my best friends from college.

I think what will happen is that I will be coming to visit for longer and longer periods at a time to help care for my mother. During those visits, I will have to make arrangements to bring my own family with me. I can’t bear the separation. I left two children crying in the driveway and I will leave two parents crying at the airport.

I have wracked my mind this week to think of ways that my parents could move. But if they moved to be near me, we would have to find all new doctors for my mother, and her doctors would have to be at least a three and a half hour drive from my house. I don’t think that is feasible. My mother makes conversation about her own mother, and how well she is doing, how well her mother’s children take care of her, and I break down and cry. I am doing the best I can. It will never come close to being good enough. Why can’t we move to her? She asks. I explain again that my husband is tenured at the university. He is the chair of the department. Our children are growing up there, and their father lives there. We aren’t coming.

In a moment of irritation, I am quick to say (and regret) that my husband and I are not moving out here to where they live even in our retirement. “Where are you going to go?” My mother asks. “I don’t know yet. Not here.” It isn’t because of her that we aren’t going to move there, and she knows this. It’s simply that we don’t want to live in this state, this location. We will have to relocate her, instead. Which, as I have already noted, is not possible. Or very difficult. I can’t figure it out right now. I have to get through the next hour, the next day.

My mother tries to exact promises from me that I won’t let my dad put her in a nursing home. That I will never put her in a nursing home. She asks me point blank today, “If you needed to ship me off, would you?” Without hesitation, I say, “Yes.” I am not trying to be cold. I am not trying to be cruel. It’s simply the truth, and if she thinks something different, she will make it hard on us now and later. The operative word here is “If.” However, I cannot care for her full time. I can barely endure these weeks. She tells me, “I have ruined your trip.” I tell her, “What do you think I expected?”

I do not have expectations that my children will care for me full time during my golden years. I hope they will visit. I do not have expectations that I will escape this life without ending up in a nursing home. Does that make me callous? Or does it make my future simply easier to bear?

I cannot imagine, right now, entering into a work situation that would make these visits more difficult to take. They are difficult enough as it is.

What are you doing about your parents as they get older? Do you have any good solutions?