I’ve been reading a lot of stories on Reddit about people who are caretakers for elderly relatives and there are an alarming number of people who are the victims of abusive relationships with their parents - often being groomed from childhood to care for their parents and grandparents at the expense of their own lives. It does make me wonder how many examples of elder abuse are the result of people who have been victimised hitting back.
Coercive control is generally talked about in terms of romantic relationships but it is a major theme in the way a lot of these people have been treated by their parents/families. There was one woman who was put into a caretaking role for her grandmother when she was 12 and raised with the expectation that caring was her only role in life - to the extent that she was pushed to become a nurse so that she would be able to provide full time nursing care for her grandmother in the future.
The worst part is that a lot have had all their options taken away - they have given up their working lives so have no money and no employment history, they have not had a chance to establish relationships and families of their own, and staying in an abusive caretaking relationship is the only reason they are not homeless. There are so many parallels to the experience of “battered wives” who eventually retaliate against their abuser.
I’m not sure there is any real solution to the mess that is human relationships, but hopefully the increased awareness of coercive control will help people recognise it in all sorts of relationships and increase the support available to people to get out of them.
My father raised my sister and I to be completely dependant on him, so much so that he actively kept us from learning about the world.
I didn’t make a friend until I was 14 years old. I wasn’t allowed to have friends. We were locked in the house. Only allowed to go to school and shopping which we were escorted to and from. We were prisoners.
Plus the violence and emotional abuse.
The damage he did to me in particular, led me down an incredibly bad path because I literally didn’t know better.
Families can be awful to each other, but we seem to have a bizarre cultural blind spot to abuse that occurs beyond childhood (as well as to the real ongoing impacts of that abuse). Once you are an adult people tend to act as if everything is a misunderstanding that can be resolved through some stereotyped Hallmark movie moment and all old people are assumed to be sweet and innocent. No, some people are just awful and they don’t magically change once they hit a certain age. People dying alone is often blamed on a cold and uncaring society but in reality it can also be people lying in the bed they made for themselves.
If we want to make meaningful changes in our society we need to accept that multiple different stories can be true and relationships are complicated - people can be both victims and perpetrators, they can have good relationships with some people and bad relationships with others and single cookie cutter responses based on unrealistic stereotypes often do as much (or more) harm as they do good.
This is absolutely so true and very rarely acknowledged or talked about. Both men and women can be abusive and commit coercive control in family relationships. The key attribute is an abuser will choose a victim they find vulnerable and work to keep them that way. For men it might be a female partner, for women they will often do it to a child or an elder. Male to female romantic relationships is visible but talking about other kinds of family coercive control is often laughed at or disbelieved, or worst of all, accepted as cultural norm. It is very very real and creates life long trauma for the victims. I think people who had normal childhoods can never really understand how toxic and devoid of love some parents can be.
The cultural norms part is definitely an issue here too - a lot of the people trapped in these caregiver roles either have other family members calling them selfish for wanting something different (I think we probably need to recognise that coercive control can be commited by groups of peoples as well as individuals) or have internalised that idea and think they are being selfish themselves. Seeing someone worrying about being selfish when they have given up everything else in their lives to care 24/7 for parents who are constantly abusive and require more physical care than one person can reasonably handle is heartbreaking.
One cultural norm is that little old ladies are weak and vulnerable.
my FIL was a sexist ass , so sexist it could not cross his mind that his new wife was an abusive bitch who was after his money, not that he had much.
His doctors told him she was abusive, his nurse, his family, but he was so wrapped up in the idea he was smarter than everyone that he couldn’t be told.
She abused him so bad.
But she was a little old lady and it would have been difficult to sue her.
@RustyRaven@briongloid i’ve seen versions of this on my family and my mother wanted me to fit into this role when my dad died.
My cousin was adopted for this reason inmind basically an indentured servant to her adopted family. She had 4 older siblings with a ton of money that could easily afforded to put mom in a nursing home. Instead she had to do elder care until my auntie passed away from Alzheimer’s. No family of her own, worked in retail for a day job to support herself.
It looks to be a fairly common situation - hopefully the reddit sub is a self-selected group with a higher than normal number of people in that position, but so many people posting there are miserable and feeling trapped. I went on there looking to get a bit more of an idea of what caring will be realistically like (I’m intending to care for my mother in future) and was not really prepared for the sheer volume of people who are being abused and don’t realise it. I mean I love my Mum, but I would not care for her if it would leave me broke and homeless, and if she develops dementia and starts to scream 24/7 or smear her own shit all over the walls she’s going into a home. No one should be in a position where they feel they have no choice but to live like that.
@RustyRaven yeah we villianize nursing homes but I’ve yet to see a situation where elder care turns out to be an actually a healthy relationship between the adult children and thier parents.
I want it work, if I had a better relationship with my mother I’d do more if it.
Also this lenses given more meaning to the ‘old maids’ of previous centuries. We’re they unmarriageable? or did thier parents intend on having a full time caregiver in thier dotage and ‘groom’ them to become caregivers?
I’m pretty sure the full time caregiver role was by design, often the youngest daughter. But the way everything worked was different back then and most people got assigned roles in life rather than being able to choose. Being a caretaker back then would have come with a home and board, which was about all most people could hope for at that time. Sometimes we have a similar idea happening now - one child becomes a caretaker and in turn inherits the family home. But too often now I think we have moved towards the idea that you (or more often that someone else) should care for someone out of “love” alone and have forgotten that does not pay the bills.
I think a lot of people’s negative attitude towards nursing homes is them mis-attributing their own decining abilities to the place they live, in much the same way some people refuse to go to hospital because “people die in hospitals”. Being stuck at home with insufficient support for your needs can be much worse than the institutionalised care of a residential home. Especially in situations where you are expecting other people to juggle full time work with a caring role being in a nursing home can be a much better situation.
There are definitely some people who have good experiences with caring for parents (which will hopefully be my experience!) but that can only happen if it is a free choice, not one forced on someone through guilt or coersion, and not when it leaves the carer with no resources to look after themselves. The “old maids” in the past would have generally gone on to be cared for by someone else in the family, or perhaps entered the church as a nun where they would have been cared for.
@RustyRaven yeah i’m the youngest daughter but I don’t get along with my mother and never have and now I live 3,000 miles away with my own life.
My cousin was the youngest ‘daughter’ in airquote because she was adopted for this task in mind. Also there was no family home. They were renting, in Tahoe which is super expensive.
My neighbor did this and she did get the family home but i’m pretty sure her brothers still have say in the matter even tho they didn’t do any work.
It seems to be common for people to leave the family home to all the children jointly and just give the carer the right to live there. If that is the case it can often lead to a situation where the other siblings resent paying a share of the costs of a home they can’t get any benefit from and maintenance is neglected. Even if it is inherited in full it can leave the carer unable to fully support themselves if they did not get a chance to establish themselves and save money independently first, again leaving them dependent on the good will of other family members to help them.
Putting people into residential care or paying for home care is hugely expensive, it’s sad that so many people who are carers for family are not valued at even a fraction of what a paid carer would receive and are instead pushed into poverty. We are lucky in Australia that we at least have a carer’s pension available to help (and unemployment benefits if you stop caring), even if it is less than minimum wage. It sounds like some of the people in USA have literally nothing and are completely dependent on the person they are caring for. No matter how horrible a position they are in they can’t stop without becoming homeless.
@RustyRaven we do have Society Security but this only works if you have a paying job that tracks your hours. And I’ve heard of programs attempting to address all these issues. In WA State there’s a ‘home health’ program where these family members can take a certification course and get paid minimum wage for doing the work they are already doing for free. And they get basic training on first aid & elder care.
The US is really 50+ different countries in some ways ( as the name itself implies).
I used to think USA states were similar to Australia’s, but once I learned more I realised it’s a lot closer to Europe and the states are a lot more like separate countries. Different towns and regions within the states also seem to be a lot more distinct and seem to be closer to what our states are.
Minimum wage for carers is a good thing, as is the training. The carer’s pension here is a bit less than minimum wage (although once you add in a few bonuses and extra assistance if you are renting it gets pretty close). I haven’t seen any training even available for elder care (outside of courses for people seeking actual employment).
There are so many parallels to the experience of “battered wives” who eventually retaliate against their abuser.
What happens is there is a tipping point when women become physically stronger than men. It’s because women continue to do physical work around the house and men lose their testosterone and do no exercise. It’s around age 65-70.
and increase the support available to people to get out of them.
family support is the best way but what happens is abusers tend to isolate their victims
Some abusers do worse than isolate their victims, they manage to get others on side supporting their abuse. In romantic relationships it might take the form of acting charming and winning over the family with public displays of affection so that when the partner expresses concern about problems their own family dismiss them. In parent/child relationships it can take the form of treating one child as a scapegoat so the whole family learn to treat them differently - a lot of the stories in the caretaking forum have people with extended families all presuring them to stay in abusive caretaking relationships while they offer nothing but criticism and blame the caretaker for being “selfish” if they ask for any support. Escaping abuse from one person is hard enough, when your entire family joins in it would be near impossible ☹️
I suppose to a very mild degree I’m going through this.
When I go to the p’s (in their late 70’s) down the bellarine i’m expected to shop, cook, clean, garden, maintain the house (ladders, heavy stuff).
We all get along well (usually).
The benefit I get is free use of the place no questions asked. The reward is proximity to beach, can grow stuff, it’s an escape and the solitude is bliss etc.
So far it hasn’t strained relationships. It is control, but the reward is something I’m glad I never threw away. Mental health wise that place has been amazing. Sure you have to do stuff. Some risky, some cumbersome and you can’t say no.
My brother on the hand has refused to care and the resentment from p’s is real.
I think most people with a healthy relationship will do some things for their parents as they get older. But there is a line where it becomes unreasonable - imagine that your parent’s live in a place you don’t like being in or get benefit from going to (which may be how your brother feels) and you are expected to give up all of your free time to do those things. I’d be pretty resentful of being expected to give up all of my own free time and happiness to be a worker bee for my parents. It sounds like you are currently in a position where you consider the balance between what you are giving and receiving to be fair, which is a positive thing for both you and your parents. But where you have mismatched expectations and priorities (which could be the situation with your brother) it can really tear relationships apart. (I’m not saying this is the actual situation in your family, just projecting a bit and using it as an example!)
For my situation I think caring for my mother will work out well for both of us and should actually be financially beneficial as well. My sister on the other hand is in a completely different situation - she and her husband have been working towards being able to partially (or even fully) retire early and are looking forward to being able to enjoy their free time. Expecting her to give up what she and her husband have been working towards would be way too much, whereas for me giving up a job I’m not enjoying that much these days is a bonus! I’m anticipating my sister being the “fun daughter” that pops in to take mum out to lunch occasionally while I’m the one doing all the hard work and cleaning 🤣 . But that’s a role I am choosing of my own free will, not one that is being forced onto me. If it did not suit me we would work out other solutions.
This has been a brilliant discussion and thankyou for posting about this issue. I’ve just read it now and it all resonates with me very strongly. It seems I share a lot of the experiences posted here, as someone who was groomed by abusive parents to be their carer and worse. With both parents passed a long time now, it surprises me sometimes how fresh the anger, hurt and indignation feels. I guess I was raised with it and it never really goes away, just hides for a while.
I’ve been reading a lot of stories on Reddit about people who are caretakers for elderly relatives and there are an alarming number of people who are the victims of abusive relationships with their parents - often being groomed from childhood to care for their parents and grandparents at the expense of their own lives. It does make me wonder how many examples of elder abuse are the result of people who have been victimised hitting back.
Coercive control is generally talked about in terms of romantic relationships but it is a major theme in the way a lot of these people have been treated by their parents/families. There was one woman who was put into a caretaking role for her grandmother when she was 12 and raised with the expectation that caring was her only role in life - to the extent that she was pushed to become a nurse so that she would be able to provide full time nursing care for her grandmother in the future.
The worst part is that a lot have had all their options taken away - they have given up their working lives so have no money and no employment history, they have not had a chance to establish relationships and families of their own, and staying in an abusive caretaking relationship is the only reason they are not homeless. There are so many parallels to the experience of “battered wives” who eventually retaliate against their abuser.
I’m not sure there is any real solution to the mess that is human relationships, but hopefully the increased awareness of coercive control will help people recognise it in all sorts of relationships and increase the support available to people to get out of them.
My father raised my sister and I to be completely dependant on him, so much so that he actively kept us from learning about the world.
I didn’t make a friend until I was 14 years old. I wasn’t allowed to have friends. We were locked in the house. Only allowed to go to school and shopping which we were escorted to and from. We were prisoners.
Plus the violence and emotional abuse.
The damage he did to me in particular, led me down an incredibly bad path because I literally didn’t know better.
He died alone.
I’m sorry you had to go through that. 🫂
Families can be awful to each other, but we seem to have a bizarre cultural blind spot to abuse that occurs beyond childhood (as well as to the real ongoing impacts of that abuse). Once you are an adult people tend to act as if everything is a misunderstanding that can be resolved through some stereotyped Hallmark movie moment and all old people are assumed to be sweet and innocent. No, some people are just awful and they don’t magically change once they hit a certain age. People dying alone is often blamed on a cold and uncaring society but in reality it can also be people lying in the bed they made for themselves.
If we want to make meaningful changes in our society we need to accept that multiple different stories can be true and relationships are complicated - people can be both victims and perpetrators, they can have good relationships with some people and bad relationships with others and single cookie cutter responses based on unrealistic stereotypes often do as much (or more) harm as they do good.
I just wanted you to know the power of that statement shook the room I’m sitting in.
The same will happen to my mother, if you can call her that.
Fuck emotionally abusive parents. Why have a kid if your just gonna abuse/neglect 'em?
That’s why. That’s what they think relationships are.
The worst get enjoyment from abusing others.
Im sorry you had to deal with it as well mate. Sometimes in life, people get what they deserve.
This is absolutely so true and very rarely acknowledged or talked about. Both men and women can be abusive and commit coercive control in family relationships. The key attribute is an abuser will choose a victim they find vulnerable and work to keep them that way. For men it might be a female partner, for women they will often do it to a child or an elder. Male to female romantic relationships is visible but talking about other kinds of family coercive control is often laughed at or disbelieved, or worst of all, accepted as cultural norm. It is very very real and creates life long trauma for the victims. I think people who had normal childhoods can never really understand how toxic and devoid of love some parents can be.
The cultural norms part is definitely an issue here too - a lot of the people trapped in these caregiver roles either have other family members calling them selfish for wanting something different (I think we probably need to recognise that coercive control can be commited by groups of peoples as well as individuals) or have internalised that idea and think they are being selfish themselves. Seeing someone worrying about being selfish when they have given up everything else in their lives to care 24/7 for parents who are constantly abusive and require more physical care than one person can reasonably handle is heartbreaking.
One cultural norm is that little old ladies are weak and vulnerable.
my FIL was a sexist ass , so sexist it could not cross his mind that his new wife was an abusive bitch who was after his money, not that he had much.
His doctors told him she was abusive, his nurse, his family, but he was so wrapped up in the idea he was smarter than everyone that he couldn’t be told.
She abused him so bad.
But she was a little old lady and it would have been difficult to sue her.
@RustyRaven @briongloid i’ve seen versions of this on my family and my mother wanted me to fit into this role when my dad died.
My cousin was adopted for this reason inmind basically an indentured servant to her adopted family. She had 4 older siblings with a ton of money that could easily afforded to put mom in a nursing home. Instead she had to do elder care until my auntie passed away from Alzheimer’s. No family of her own, worked in retail for a day job to support herself.
It looks to be a fairly common situation - hopefully the reddit sub is a self-selected group with a higher than normal number of people in that position, but so many people posting there are miserable and feeling trapped. I went on there looking to get a bit more of an idea of what caring will be realistically like (I’m intending to care for my mother in future) and was not really prepared for the sheer volume of people who are being abused and don’t realise it. I mean I love my Mum, but I would not care for her if it would leave me broke and homeless, and if she develops dementia and starts to scream 24/7 or smear her own shit all over the walls she’s going into a home. No one should be in a position where they feel they have no choice but to live like that.
@RustyRaven yeah we villianize nursing homes but I’ve yet to see a situation where elder care turns out to be an actually a healthy relationship between the adult children and thier parents.
I want it work, if I had a better relationship with my mother I’d do more if it.
Also this lenses given more meaning to the ‘old maids’ of previous centuries. We’re they unmarriageable? or did thier parents intend on having a full time caregiver in thier dotage and ‘groom’ them to become caregivers?
I’m pretty sure the full time caregiver role was by design, often the youngest daughter. But the way everything worked was different back then and most people got assigned roles in life rather than being able to choose. Being a caretaker back then would have come with a home and board, which was about all most people could hope for at that time. Sometimes we have a similar idea happening now - one child becomes a caretaker and in turn inherits the family home. But too often now I think we have moved towards the idea that you (or more often that someone else) should care for someone out of “love” alone and have forgotten that does not pay the bills.
I think a lot of people’s negative attitude towards nursing homes is them mis-attributing their own decining abilities to the place they live, in much the same way some people refuse to go to hospital because “people die in hospitals”. Being stuck at home with insufficient support for your needs can be much worse than the institutionalised care of a residential home. Especially in situations where you are expecting other people to juggle full time work with a caring role being in a nursing home can be a much better situation.
There are definitely some people who have good experiences with caring for parents (which will hopefully be my experience!) but that can only happen if it is a free choice, not one forced on someone through guilt or coersion, and not when it leaves the carer with no resources to look after themselves. The “old maids” in the past would have generally gone on to be cared for by someone else in the family, or perhaps entered the church as a nun where they would have been cared for.
@RustyRaven yeah i’m the youngest daughter but I don’t get along with my mother and never have and now I live 3,000 miles away with my own life.
My cousin was the youngest ‘daughter’ in airquote because she was adopted for this task in mind. Also there was no family home. They were renting, in Tahoe which is super expensive.
My neighbor did this and she did get the family home but i’m pretty sure her brothers still have say in the matter even tho they didn’t do any work.
It seems to be common for people to leave the family home to all the children jointly and just give the carer the right to live there. If that is the case it can often lead to a situation where the other siblings resent paying a share of the costs of a home they can’t get any benefit from and maintenance is neglected. Even if it is inherited in full it can leave the carer unable to fully support themselves if they did not get a chance to establish themselves and save money independently first, again leaving them dependent on the good will of other family members to help them.
Putting people into residential care or paying for home care is hugely expensive, it’s sad that so many people who are carers for family are not valued at even a fraction of what a paid carer would receive and are instead pushed into poverty. We are lucky in Australia that we at least have a carer’s pension available to help (and unemployment benefits if you stop caring), even if it is less than minimum wage. It sounds like some of the people in USA have literally nothing and are completely dependent on the person they are caring for. No matter how horrible a position they are in they can’t stop without becoming homeless.
@RustyRaven we do have Society Security but this only works if you have a paying job that tracks your hours. And I’ve heard of programs attempting to address all these issues. In WA State there’s a ‘home health’ program where these family members can take a certification course and get paid minimum wage for doing the work they are already doing for free. And they get basic training on first aid & elder care.
The US is really 50+ different countries in some ways ( as the name itself implies).
I used to think USA states were similar to Australia’s, but once I learned more I realised it’s a lot closer to Europe and the states are a lot more like separate countries. Different towns and regions within the states also seem to be a lot more distinct and seem to be closer to what our states are.
Minimum wage for carers is a good thing, as is the training. The carer’s pension here is a bit less than minimum wage (although once you add in a few bonuses and extra assistance if you are renting it gets pretty close). I haven’t seen any training even available for elder care (outside of courses for people seeking actual employment).
In my culture it’s the expectation of the eldest son.
Interesting. Is that to do the actual caretaking, or to provide the home & financial support and someone else provide the actual care?
What happens is there is a tipping point when women become physically stronger than men. It’s because women continue to do physical work around the house and men lose their testosterone and do no exercise. It’s around age 65-70.
family support is the best way but what happens is abusers tend to isolate their victims
Some abusers do worse than isolate their victims, they manage to get others on side supporting their abuse. In romantic relationships it might take the form of acting charming and winning over the family with public displays of affection so that when the partner expresses concern about problems their own family dismiss them. In parent/child relationships it can take the form of treating one child as a scapegoat so the whole family learn to treat them differently - a lot of the stories in the caretaking forum have people with extended families all presuring them to stay in abusive caretaking relationships while they offer nothing but criticism and blame the caretaker for being “selfish” if they ask for any support. Escaping abuse from one person is hard enough, when your entire family joins in it would be near impossible ☹️
I walked away from my family of origin. Parent and sibs. I refuse to play the role they have assigned me. I am not that person.
They responded with surprise and scorn. They know why.
I do worry for my bro who has been doing caring for elderly father, I did offer alliance, friendship and help but he declined.
I suppose to a very mild degree I’m going through this.
When I go to the p’s (in their late 70’s) down the bellarine i’m expected to shop, cook, clean, garden, maintain the house (ladders, heavy stuff).
We all get along well (usually).
The benefit I get is free use of the place no questions asked. The reward is proximity to beach, can grow stuff, it’s an escape and the solitude is bliss etc.
So far it hasn’t strained relationships. It is control, but the reward is something I’m glad I never threw away. Mental health wise that place has been amazing. Sure you have to do stuff. Some risky, some cumbersome and you can’t say no.
My brother on the hand has refused to care and the resentment from p’s is real.
I’m not sure where my mind stands on the matter.
I think most people with a healthy relationship will do some things for their parents as they get older. But there is a line where it becomes unreasonable - imagine that your parent’s live in a place you don’t like being in or get benefit from going to (which may be how your brother feels) and you are expected to give up all of your free time to do those things. I’d be pretty resentful of being expected to give up all of my own free time and happiness to be a worker bee for my parents. It sounds like you are currently in a position where you consider the balance between what you are giving and receiving to be fair, which is a positive thing for both you and your parents. But where you have mismatched expectations and priorities (which could be the situation with your brother) it can really tear relationships apart. (I’m not saying this is the actual situation in your family, just projecting a bit and using it as an example!)
For my situation I think caring for my mother will work out well for both of us and should actually be financially beneficial as well. My sister on the other hand is in a completely different situation - she and her husband have been working towards being able to partially (or even fully) retire early and are looking forward to being able to enjoy their free time. Expecting her to give up what she and her husband have been working towards would be way too much, whereas for me giving up a job I’m not enjoying that much these days is a bonus! I’m anticipating my sister being the “fun daughter” that pops in to take mum out to lunch occasionally while I’m the one doing all the hard work and cleaning 🤣 . But that’s a role I am choosing of my own free will, not one that is being forced onto me. If it did not suit me we would work out other solutions.
This has been a brilliant discussion and thankyou for posting about this issue. I’ve just read it now and it all resonates with me very strongly. It seems I share a lot of the experiences posted here, as someone who was groomed by abusive parents to be their carer and worse. With both parents passed a long time now, it surprises me sometimes how fresh the anger, hurt and indignation feels. I guess I was raised with it and it never really goes away, just hides for a while.