I’m scared that I'm becoming a terrible burden to my family
DEAR BEL I’M 63 and still working in a demanding job that leaves me flopped on the sofa most evenings with very little energy (or time) for much else.
I’m trying to be sensible about retirement, but don’t know how I’m going to fill my days and also feel that perhaps I’m becoming too reliant on my daughter for company.
I am married but my husband works very long hours, including weekends, and will not be stopping any time soon as it is a financial necessity.
My daughter and her family live an hour’s drive away — so I can’t just pop in for a quick chat after work. However, I generally spend one day of the weekend with them.
But recently my son-in-law has changed his job, which means he’s more often home at weekends, when previously he had to work.
My daughter used to rely on my help with the children, but they are no longer babies and therefore not so demanding.
My daughter now works full time so I know her time off is limited, but sometimes I now feel a bit like a spare
How full of insight those final questions are. They suggest that you know perfectly well what’s at the heart of your problem, and it is not whether your daughter and her family would like you to cut down your visits.
No, no, no. Li ke s o many part when I’m visiting. It makes me wonder if I should cut back my visits.
Unfortunately, with my retirement looming within the next year or two, I think I might rely on these visits more rather than less.
I don’t want to ask my daughter outright if she would prefer it if I did not come every week, as I can imagine how difficult it would be for her to say: ‘Don’t come round so often.’
She is a very kind person and I know she would not want to hurt my feelings. I don’t want to turn into the sort of elderly parent that nags: ‘I never see you’ or ‘You haven’t phoned me.’
The other day I caught myself thinking: ‘She could have called me to let me know about . . . (something trivial).’ I gave myself a good talking to!
Do you think my concern is that I’m not actually needed or useful any more, or if I’m confusing the family growing up with the change in my life — ie retirement?
I’m usually a very decisive person, so it’s odd for me to feel that I don’t know what to do.
MARY sixty- something men and women, you’re being forced to wonder what the future holds in the absolute, somewhat depressing, certainty that central to it is Growing old.
Me, I’m hoping that by the time I’m coasting through my 70s ( God willing) I shall have come to terms with the process.
Maybe I never will. Perhaps I’ll still feel disgruntled each time I raise my arm to check out the saggy wrinkles.
But i don’t want to fritter away the years i have left by fretting about what can’t be changed.
Which takes us back to Growing Old. All roads lead there, Mary, and there ain’t a darn thing we can do about it.
You need to start looking at your life as it is, in order to prepare for the next stage. it’s healthy to see our time on earth as stages, or ‘passages’ — as in the U.s. author Gail sheehy’s book on ageing, New Passages. she gives the stages colourful names, like Flourishing Forties, Flaming Fifties and serene sixties — which may be a tad over the top (sage seventies?), but is helpful in its positivity.
You might like this book, which contains much wisdom.
YOU’re still working and, like me, realising that we don’t have as much energy as before. since work obviously takes up much of your time and you spend one day each weekend driving to visit the family, there’s little time for looking after yourself — to give you more vitality.
You should change this and consider some ‘me time’, as well as taking up an activity which takes you back to what made you really happy when you were, say, 11.
This is a serious suggestion. in fact, i’ll come clean and confess that this good advice — about taking care of yourself and discovering your inner creativity and selfhood — was given to only two weeks ago, by a friend who happens to be a distinguished clinical psychologist. i’m obeying her!
it’s a pity your husband works such long hours but, i’d like you to also start thinking of that as a stage.
Do you carve out time to do things as a couple? if not, this is seriously something you should work on. it bothers me that you use the word ‘looming’ about retirement. That attitude is one you have to change.
Give thanks that you’ve reached this mood now, giving yourself plenty of time to think, read, embrace change and discover a new ‘you’.
some homework would be good. Books that are practical as well as inspirational include the sheehy; Betty Friedan’s The Fountain Of Age; The second half Of Your Life by Jill shaw ruddock, and The Warmth Of The heart Prevents Your Body From rusting by Marie de hennezel.
EACH is very different from the next but they are all full of insight, especially the last one. Go for it: read, rest, think, and start something new. Whatever you do, do not lay all these feelings on the beloved little family living one hour away, because i would hate them to share the burden of your current worry. There’s no necessity.
They l ove you and t hey will always need you, but it would be healthy for you not to need them quite so much.
You know, one week you could be so busy having a massage then going to a painting class, say, that there’s no time for a visit — and that would give you so much to tell them about, so much new life to share.