Anonymous wrote:I have a sibling and I am 100% responsible for my mom. He visits maybe once every year or two and has nothing to do with assisting with any of her care. Don’t feel sorry for onlies, feel sorry for anyone who has to carry the burden by themselves.

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I have one sibling. That sibling has not seen my parents in almost 10 years. They only saw them for the 15 years before that simply because I paid for them and their kids airfare to come every xmas (we used to live 2 hours from my parents). We had a fight, nobody enjoyed that last visit, in fact we were miserable, sibling was in the wrong and hasn't apologized to anyone, so they haven't asked to visit since then.
Basically, if someone else isn't paying, they are not visiting. But they can find the time and money to go with BF to visit his family (well his kids, because heck he's older than my parents and no he's not rich at all).

So needless to say, I am the one responsible for my parents. Despite being 3k miles away, we used to fly them out every xmas for 10 days and sometimes in the summer. Then covid hit and they are aging too much for them to fly. So I go 3-4times/year to visit them. I got them set up in a CCRC (paid the entry fee) so that they are well taken care of in between my visits, should something happen.
I know that when their health declines it will still be me doing everything---I'm the one authroized to do that (I have POA). My sibling is only listed as "you can inform them of parents health issues, but they cannot make any decisions".
Waiting to see if sibling even attempts to visit them once their health really begins declining (they are mid 80s, so it could be anytime). Or even bothers to attend a funeral---I'll probably have to pay for them to come.

Anonymous wrote:I'm a paid caregiver and over the decade I've done this work I've seen many families where one child shoulders the vast majority of the burden of eldercare of parents while the other siblings criticize.

Very few families have an ideal dynamic where everyone chips in equitably.

Thank you for the care that you provide. My sister did not visit or call Mom the last 6 years of her life. Then she was hyper critical at the end.

Anonymous wrote:I have a sibling and I am 100% responsible for my mom. He visits maybe once every year or two and has nothing to do with assisting with any of her care. Don’t feel sorry for onlies, feel sorry for anyone who has to carry the burden by themselves.

Same for my DH - he has a brother who can barely take care of himself let alone help with his mom. Plus many people who have siblings who live across the country or overseas. There rarely is an even distribution of the burden of caring for elderly parents no matter how many siblings you have.

Anonymous wrote:I have a sibling and I am 100% responsible for my mom. He visits maybe once every year or two and has nothing to do with assisting with any of her care. Don’t feel sorry for onlies, feel sorry for anyone who has to carry the burden by themselves.

Me too. Two sisters and a brother and it's all me and my husband. That's it. We have an only. We are making sure this doesn't happen to him. We will have everything outlined and done, including $$ for his life too.

Anonymous wrote:I have a sibling and I am 100% responsible for my mom. He visits maybe once every year or two and has nothing to do with assisting with any of her care. Don’t feel sorry for onlies, feel sorry for anyone who has to carry the burden by themselves.

Me too. Two sisters and a brother and it's all me and my husband. That's it. We have an only. We are making sure this doesn't happen to him. We will have everything outlined and done, including $$ for his life too.

Not the OP, but I am an only child (52 yrs old - one DD at home) taking care of my mother (87 yr old immigrant with with Alzheimer). My father passed away when I was 7, mom never remarried. It is a lonely journey for sure.

I hear the terrible stories of siblings either not helping out at all, or just making lives more complicated because nobody can compromise. I cannot put myself in other people’s shoes, but I just wish I had somebody to bounce ideas off from. My mother has been living with us since the pandemic. I had to quit my job. She doesn’t have a lot of savings, so placing her in a facility needs to be put off as much as possible. Thankfully my husband is completely on board, and helps out as much as possible. Due to the high price of eldercare, I have had to miss a few of my daughters’ events in college and HS. I am sure I am not the only caregiver who has had to deal with this, but I really have no options for care now. Trust me, it is no fun being the only child taking care of a much older parent.

Anonymous wrote:Going through elder care issues and I am so thankful of my siblings to help should the burden. I know a number of friends with onlies and tbh I feel bad for their kids. Flame away

Sweetie you are delusional at best. I have siblings yet I care for my mom as an only. Stop putting your own inseyon others. Siblings in some families don’t mean a thing! Speaking from experience.

Anonymous wrote:I call troll. You come to this board to brainstorm how to deal with eldercare and challenging siblings or elders or doctors who don't believe you about concerning behaviors. If things are going perfectly, you are busy helping your parent/seeing siblings/focusing on family and friends. You don't come here to post how lucky you are and to pity people.

Not even a creative troll

I not only have to care for my parents, which so far isn’t too bad but I also have to care for my older brother who never launched. That is going to harder since my other 2 siblings don’t want to help.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm a paid caregiver and over the decade I've done this work I've seen many families where one child shoulders the vast majority of the burden of eldercare of parents while the other siblings criticize.

Very few families have an ideal dynamic where everyone chips in equitably.

This is true, but for us, it falls on the sibling who lives the closest with no younger children, and who are single. Both my spouse and I have more than one sibling, and in both cases, the sibling who takes care of our elderly parents is and has been the sibling who lives the closest to them, and they also are either childless or have an adult child. We have stated that these siblings should get more of the estate when the parents pass.

We are all super grateful for our siblings, and we do try to pitch in when we can. We live far away from our parents.

When we had DC#1, we thought it was going to be one and done, but the more I thought about it, the more sad I was for my DC who would grow up without a sibling and have to shoulder the burden of looking out for us when we got older.

WTH?? Kids are not a substitute for financially planning your own care or developing your own communities (hobbies, church, whatever) to engage you in your old age. Shoulder your own burden like an adult.

Anonymous wrote:My mother was only able to have one child, due to a devastating and chronic illness.

Are you somehow saying it's her fault for having only one child?

You really want to go on the board with JD Vance?

What a little turd you are, OP.

dp.. I don't think OP is saying it's anyone's fault, but that onlies do have that sole burden.

Anonymous wrote:I'm a paid caregiver and over the decade I've done this work I've seen many families where one child shoulders the vast majority of the burden of eldercare of parents while the other siblings criticize.

Very few families have an ideal dynamic where everyone chips in equitably.

This is true, but for us, it falls on the sibling who lives the closest with no younger children, and who are single. Both my spouse and I have more than one sibling, and in both cases, the sibling who takes care of our elderly parents is and has been the sibling who lives the closest to them, and they also are either childless or have an adult child. We have stated that these siblings should get more of the estate when the parents pass.

We are all super grateful for our siblings, and we do try to pitch in when we can. We live far away from our parents.

When we had DC#1, we thought it was going to be one and done, but the more I thought about it, the more sad I was for my DC who would grow up without a sibling and have to shoulder the burden of looking out for us when we got older.

And as a friend once said to me, "You have to have another, because who else would understand and commiserate about how crazy your parents are but a sibling".

Of course, there are no guarantees in life, but if you don't have a sibling, then 100% the only child will have to shoulder that burden alone.

Anonymous wrote:My mother was only able to have one child, due to a devastating and chronic illness.

Are you somehow saying it's her fault for having only one child?

You really want to go on the board with JD Vance?

What a little turd you are, OP.

It's our right wing troll testing the water to see how they can make their views seem tolerable.

My mother was only able to have one child, due to a devastating and chronic illness.

Are you somehow saying it's her fault for having only one child?

You really want to go on the board with JD Vance?

What a little turd you are, OP.

A good friend of mine is now dealing with two very elderly parents who are deteriorating rapidly and a good for nothing sibling who used to suck money out of the parents and now is trying to latch on to my friend.

Oh how my friend wishes she was an only!