Norma Rosenthal and Toby Donner have been friends for many years. Both have been through the bumps that life often throws our way: Toby was a young widow who lost her husband to cancer when she was just 38-years-old and raised two children on her own. Norma started a new career at 40 and found herself working 50 – 60 hour weeks while juggling a husband, two daughters and out-of-state family. Both found a network for survival with each other and their closest girlfriends who they turned to in times of joy and crisis.
In recent years, their conversations were often dominated by talk about aging parents. Toby, who had remarried, was dealing with her late and present husbands’ elders as well as her own. Norma’s lived out of state and their health had taken a sudden dramatic swing downwards.
As the two began to look for resources, Toby was struck by the need for a place where those dealing with their aging loved ones could share wisdom, stories and experiences. It was important to find a platform where “boomers” could vocalize the challenges we all face. The idea of a blog site came to mind – the catalyst for http://www.girlfriendswithagingparents.com
A way for the “sandwich generation” to reach out and connect, the blog is an extended circle of friends. Both women and men ask questions and offer advice on senior issues from caregiving, dealing with siblings and/or long distance, financial, legal and medical issues, to name but a few. Stories have been posted from all over the world, as elder care crosses all ethnicities, religions and age groups. Toby and Norma moderate the conversations.
A recent blog deals with the financial considerations of caregiving. How does a caregiver survive economically when they are devoting both their financial and personal resources to tending to their aging parents? More and more of those in their 50s through 70s find themselves caught in just this situation. Another contributor was worried if she had the finances to retire, after seeing what her parents’ lifestyle cost as they aged.
Toby and Norma invite everyone to join in the conversation, sharing stories, photos, topics of concern and lessons learned along the way.
These articles appeared in the October 2012 issue of Northwest Prime Time, the Puget Sound region’s monthly publication celebrating life after 50.
