In a persuasive new book, aging expert Laurel Kennedy describes The Daughter Trap that holds back too many Boomer women. (Be sure to see my colleague Carol Orsborn’s praise for Laurel’s book.)
Kennedy applies extensive research to confirm something we all probably see in our own families: daughters bear the brunt of the burden of managing care for their aging parents (and parents-in-law). While this role reflects the facts that daughters of earlier eras may have had the time to perform these essential family functions, it generates intense conflict for women who now work alongside, and as hard as, their brothers, husbands, and sons.
Kennedy presents a number of startling facts about a caregiving burden that is especially unfair in a world where most women work:
- The typical female caregiver forfeits more than $659,000 by providing care for others.
- Women lose, on average, 11.5 years of work to caregiving responsibilities; men lose only 1.3 years for the same reason.
- Women retire early to take care of aging parents; men retire early to accept early buyouts.
- Caregivers experience a higher level of emotional and physical pain than their non-caregiving peers.
- Women can spend more years caring for an aging parent than they did for their own children.
The Boomer women who thought they had successfully managed the balance between work and motherhood now face a similar, and often more trying challenge: managing the balance between work and daughterhood.
This is the “daughter trap,” and at VibrantNation.com we recognize that it comes at an especially painful time for women who are often feeling a surge of post-menopausal energy and relishing the ability to spend time and money, for the first time, on themselves. Our own research has shown that caregivers can’t even go on vacation.
What does all of this mean for others, whether employers who need working Boomer women to perform well, politicians who wants them paying taxes (rather than living off benefits as they themselves age), and husbands and other family members who want some undistracted time with them?
Laurel Kennedy makes the persuasive case that it means they need to adapt their employment policies, legislation, and family practices to support these women better.
At VibrantNation.com, we see women enjoying a brief respite – maybe even a period of denial – about their caregiving responsibilities. We know that Vibrant Women enjoy whatever time they can find to focus on themselves, and for that reason few of them self-identify as “caregivers.”
But we realize, and Kennedy reminds us with the results of hundreds of interviews with real Boomer women, that their daily lives, their health and their retirement savings often show what women themselves may want to deny: their current lives, and their futures, are defined by the heavy sacrifices they have to make today for their parents and parents-in-law.
While Kennedy knows there are no easy solutions, she also describes many of the professional, legislative, and community-based solutions that could ease the burdens on 50+ daughters and give them a chance to live the lives they have earned.
Without suggesting that these women resent their role as loving daughters, Kennedy reminds us that marketers, politicians and employers who want – who need – to engage these women will gain their business, their support and their loyalty if they help them be awesome daughters and satisfied Vibrant Women at the same time.
And your point is???