Seniors Who Outlive Their Adult Children

As parents, we never expect to outlive our children.  The natural order of things is that we will die before our kids and they will be around to help care for us in our old age.  However,  with the growing healthy senior population it becoming more common for the elderly to become caregivers a second time to their adult children battling cancer, heart disease or other health problems.

A 2012 study by the American Medical Association found that the current generation may be the first to encounter parents outliving their children due to childhood obesity which in turn can cause adults in middle age to suffer from hypertension, osteoarthritis, diabetes, stroke, chronic fatigue and fibromyalgia.

The number of young and middle-aged adults becoming obese at increasingly younger ages is resulting a greater incidence of chronic disease and shortened life expectancy.   Research from the University of Michigan’s Joyce Lee, a pediatric endocrinologist, found that people born between 1966 and 1985 became obese at a much faster rate than previous generations.

Dealing with the death of an adult child can result in feelings of guilt or anger at the unfairness of the loss.  As with any death it is important to take care of your own health, seek support and give yourself time to process the loss and experience your grief.  Adding to the stress of losing a child before their time can be the worry over who will take care of you when the time comes.  The concern over who will care for the elderly who never had children is also growing as rates of childlessness rise to an estimated 25 per cent among baby boomers.

For better insight into grieving the loss of an adult child and how to offer support, give a listen to the CBC News report from Oct. 2014 by following the link : http://www.cbc.ca/news/grieving-the-loss-of-an-adult-child-1.2760456 .

Next:  Who will care for the childless in old age?