Nothing in old age is easy, it seems. I hate what you've had to deal with in helping your parents. My parents took good care of themselves and never really got to grow old. Cancer got both of them in their 60s. So while I haven't watched my parents fade mentally, I did watch them die slow, hard deaths. Life can be so brutal.
Of course, I had feelings similar to yours, even though our cultural backgrounds are different. That feeling of "they've done everything for me, how can I not be there for them?" is the same. But the toughest part is, no matter how hard we try, we can't fix what's wrong. We can try our best to help them--as I did and I know you continue to do--but we'll never fix what's wrong. Also, I felt completely unprepared for this adult stuff and really felt impostor syndrome in a big way. I think anyone who cares feels the same thing. That's life, even if we wish it weren't so.
Appreciate the 加油! Gonna need all the fuel I can get. And yeah... turns out 'generationally American' just means the cultural programming runs deeper than we thought. Let's talk soon.
Nothing in old age is easy, it seems. I hate what you've had to deal with in helping your parents. My parents took good care of themselves and never really got to grow old. Cancer got both of them in their 60s. So while I haven't watched my parents fade mentally, I did watch them die slow, hard deaths. Life can be so brutal.
Of course, I had feelings similar to yours, even though our cultural backgrounds are different. That feeling of "they've done everything for me, how can I not be there for them?" is the same. But the toughest part is, no matter how hard we try, we can't fix what's wrong. We can try our best to help them--as I did and I know you continue to do--but we'll never fix what's wrong. Also, I felt completely unprepared for this adult stuff and really felt impostor syndrome in a big way. I think anyone who cares feels the same thing. That's life, even if we wish it weren't so.
Ernie, this was so beautiful. You're SUCH a beautiful writer.
Thanks for sharing this. I'm sorry for all the hard bits.
Thanks for saying that, Marsha. And for reading. It helps to know I'm not just shouting into the void with this stuff.
I wish we had gotten to talk more prior, but … yeah… these lessons… (still persist culturally despite being generationally “American”)
🫂 🫂
⛽️⛽️⛽️
Appreciate the 加油! Gonna need all the fuel I can get. And yeah... turns out 'generationally American' just means the cultural programming runs deeper than we thought. Let's talk soon.