Caregiving rarely begins with a crisis. It starts with small favors, quiet shifts—and one day, you realize you’re in charge of someone else’s life.
It started with a midnight potato salad. As Kelly stabbed at the potatoes, trying to decide if they were cooked enough for her mother’s famous recipe, she realized what had quietly happened. She wasn’t cooking for her mother anymore. She was caring for her. You never make the decision to become a caregiver. Instead, you make a thousand tiny decisions. Suddenly it’s 1 a.m. and you’re making the potato salad your 80-year-old mother promised her guests.
In what feels like a moment, you’re in charge of another person’s life.
How did this happen?
Welcome to Care Creep—Population: You
According to a recent study, 63 million people are helping to care for an adult or child with a medical condition or disability. For most people, caregiving doesn’t begin with a crisis. It begins with a favor. Pick up groceries. Shovel snow. Take the car in for inspection. ”Then, before long, there’s a person, typically an eldest daughter (though the demographics are shifting), leaning into the role of caregiver,” said Kim Elliot, founder of Gray Monster, an online community for caregivers. What started out as occasionally helping becomes an ever-increasing list of tasks stretching to every corner of their life.
It won’t be long before family, neighbors, and health care professionals elect you “the one.” The most overwhelming part is that it’s a lifetime appointment, and no one else is remotely interested in taking over the job. It’s as if everyone else had a secret meeting and decided you would be the one to take charge, because “Women are just better at this stuff” or “They like you better.”
Each new thing seems to lead you to three more possible problems. How will you manage it all? You won’t. Although caregiving is often a solo journey, it shouldn’t be. It’s too big a commitment for just one person. In the words of Bill Gates, “Focus on what you are good at; delegate all else.”
Build Your Team
My family is cobbling together a caregiver team for my elderly parents. My brother is their driver, my son does the heavy lifting, and I try to manage any paperwork snafus. No matter who does what, we all end up paying some price. Childhood battles are reincarnated into battles over our parents’ care. Guilt over not doing enough. Resentment over doing too much. Fear that we’re making the wrong decisions. And it all takes a toll. A recent survey found that 47 percent of caregivers suffered negative financial impacts ranging from spending their savings to losing/leaving their job to taking on debt, as well as mental and physical health problems.
That’s why you need a team.
My aging aunt recently gave up her driver’s license (there was an unfortunate incident with a large cement post in the Walmart parking lot). All her children, children-in-law, and grandchildren take turns as her driver. With the chauffeuring spread out, my aunt doesn’t feel she’s “bothering” people and my relatives each only chauffeur once or twice a month. Even siblings across the country can help with many tasks such as filling out the endless paperwork that accompanies aging in America.
Who’s Really In Charge?
Despite the time, despite the stress—sometimes all your “help” isn’t welcomed. Lists. Changes. A whiff of bossiness. Cue the frosty silence. My suggestion that mother scale back her Thanksgiving pie production? Rejected. (For the record: 22 pies in 2024.)
You may be managing your loved one’s life but you become absent from your own. And on the surface, we’re happy to do it. After all, they raised us. We love them. But secretly we want them to be grateful.
It doesn’t always work out that way.
Aging well isn’t magic—it’s management. Define what “good enough” looks like, talk like adults, and make a plan. Hope isn’t a strategy. Because here’s the truth—some decisions are yours to make, but plenty still belong to them. Let them steer where they can: the routines, the meals, the number of apple pies. Otherwise? You’ll miss what matters most to them. The Gray Monster community believes that “conversation before crisis prevents chaos.”
So keep talking, keep checking in. Because one day, “We want to stay in our home” may quietly become “We’re thinking about downsizing” and you don’t want to miss it.
7 Responses
My mother is 81, about to start her 5th year since the diagnosis of her Alzheimer’s. She is doing okay, not great, but functions well given her situation. I am very well aware of what’s upcoming. I am the oldest daughter and I am doing a lot. She lives with my father, who manages her day to day, but I’m doing the “behind the scenes” stuff. And every week I take her out to lunch, which she and I both love. My husband’s parents both died of cancer with their illnesses about 6 months. This was many years ago. He says now with what we’re dealing with that he’s glad it happened like that for his parents.
Hi Judy, What you’re doing matters more than you probably realize — especially those weekly lunches. That rhythm, that shared time, is a gift to both of you. The “behind the scenes” work is invisible but enormous. And yes… the long goodbye is its own kind of grief. —susan
I’m a professional caregiver. My mother is in her 90s. She says she’s doing fine and doesn’t need me yet. I take care of a 98 year old man around 35 hours per week. He’s fun, still mentally sharp but his body is rebelling. I have morphed into “his person” the one he expects every morning. I love my job but I also know I’ll be saying goodbye one day and it will be the last. If you don’t get attached, you’re not doing your job!!
Cecilia, “If you don’t get attached, you’re not doing your job.” That line says everything. Becoming someone’s person is sacred — and heavy. Loving the work while knowing it has an ending is such a particular kind of strength. Thank you for what you do.—susan
SPOT ON! I finally have it writing. My mother just expected me to do “it”. It came to the point where my siblings, rather than ask what they could do to help, began treating me the same way. By the way…I am the oldest, and a daughter.
Ahh. Oldest. Daughter. Of course. That expectation gets assigned without discussion — and then quietly expands. I’m glad you see it clearly now. Naming it is powerful, even if it doesn’t magically fix the dynamic.Thanks for sharing. —susan
Thanks for sharing, Jodi. Caregivers for aging parents can Call the Alzheimer’s Association free 24/7 helpline at 800.272.3900 for help, support and information related to Alzheimer’s or other dementia. Connect with a live person by phone.