Parent Sandwich

People make different choices about their relationships. Back in the 80s, when I met my husband, within our social circles, it was still the accepted norm to meet someone, get married and then have kids. We followed that pattern and after 7 years of marriage, started our family.

When you have a freedom like that, you don't really appreciate it. Those 7 years where we could stay up talking to friends until 3 in the morning, cadge Sunday dinner off the in-laws with little notice, lay in bed on a Sunday morning until it was actually Sunday afternoon and fit in work commitments around it all and still have plenty of time for each other.

Then Bam!  Babies arrive and you can't distinguish one end of the day from another. Relentless rounds of feeding, changing, smiling at relatives and friends who've come round to coo, leave you unable to stir a cuppa, so stirring any passion is completely out of the question. After childbirth your intimate areas don't quite hold the allure of sultry promise as previously. When you've had to put your private parts in the public domain of a hospital birth it seems like everyone's had a look up there including the guy who only came in to the room to change the bins! So it takes a while to think of yourself as attractive again.

Though debilitating at the time, the sharp end of parenthood passes after a while and then you continue on to each new phase or, if you're like us,  you do it all again and repeat the baby madness with the added complication of a toddler in the mix. If you think the 1st was tricky, you don't know what has hit you with a 2nd!

Still, without any formal parenting qualification and no prior manual of support, we grew into our parent role and did the best we could to support our kids from one phase to another: baby, toddler, school years into teenager and beyond.

Somewhere along the line, it gets easier doesn't it? Kids grow up and the family dynamic changes and you get to that point where you can stop being so much of a parent and get back a little of that freedom can't you? I mean, that appeared to be what I observed some friends doing. I began to think of possible couple holidays that we might have and fantasize about moments of calm, in a more settled house. Ask a woman what her fantasies are and you might expect all sorts of erotic scenarios with various hunks playing the lead. Actually, it's more likely to involve the need to carve out a bit of peace and quiet, sipping wine somewhere with a pleasant view and a slice of cake!

Anyway, I should get to the 'parent sandwich.' This is something that has happened to us over the last decade I suppose. Not only are we parents to our kids, something that we willingly if somewhat naively signed up for, but somewhere along the line we have adopted the role of parent to our own parents.

I lost my Dad six years ago but to be more accurate, I lost the clever, funny, kind man that he was ten years ago when his illness struck and smudged areas of brilliance in his brain. So looking back on it, from then I had to step into that parent role to explain basic daily things to my Dad and to support my Mum. Not only had she lost all the things I had with Dad, but she had lost her soulmate too and looked like a ship cast away on what was to become a very stormy sea.

Not long after his death, I almost lost my Mum too. A perforated bowel and sepsis did not make a good prognosis but somehow, after all the difficult years with Dad, she found the strength and reserves to come out the other side fighting.  It was probably a six month fight when at its most difficult, yet to this day she lives with the effects of the time. Being the positive person she is, she manages well and doesn't often let on that she's feeling emotional or anxious or lonely. So my 'parent' duties with Mum have reduced to more of a checking in and supporting from time to time and that's absolutely fine. 

More recently, it is my husband's turn to be the sandwich filling. Both of his parents are now in their 70s and have growing health issues and lessening independence. A proud and driven man, he has risen admirably to the task and, as the eldest child, feels duty bound to carry the weight of it all on his shoulders alone.

I never realised how the lines of responsibility and duties of care blur as your parents enter that phase of life, where they need you back in their lives more than they ever like to admit.
Like a dough stretched out, being pulled from each end by our kids and our parents, I find the safest survival tactic is to stick together and hang on in there. From time to time, they loosen their grip and we can take up the slack to remould ourselves and start again. 
We may not be in a place where an exotic couple's holiday is possible but a moment here and there for each other will have to do. I'm lucky to still have the man by my side who was acceptable in the 80s and, all things considered, he's okay now too.

If you're currently coping with a parent with dementia there are support networks out there, for example: https://www.dementiauk.org/ 
Perhaps you have other methods of support that you can recommend too?