“I would not wish to be a burden to my children.”  This was reportedly said by a woman about to enter the hospital for a series of tests. It was her rationale for keeping from her adult sons and daughters news of her health crisis. She did not want them to know of her health crisis.

The identity of the woman is not known to me, only that she is a retired person living in Florida. But she could be a whole lot of people because her underlying attitude is shared by many Americans. They think it unreasonable, even wrong, to expect their younger family members to take responsibility for their care.

You can understand some reasons for this attitude. Parents in the older generation may wish to respect the freedom of adult children to live their own lives without being inhibited by burdens imposed on them by others. These children may have children of their own who need their constant care and attention and may be pressed by work responsibilities.

Members of the older generation may feel it only fair to give their daughters and sons the same scope to find their way through early adulthood that they themselves had.  They may also remember how, in the old days, it used to happen often that women, especially, would lose marriage opportunities because their parents expected them to take on their care.

As the father of a young woman searching for her life’s work, I recognize this impulse in myself. I would not relish having my daughter’s family life or her career diverted by her feeling the need to take care of me. An only child, she might feel obligated to respond to me at a time when important opportunities lay before her.

In some instances, relationships between adult children and their parents are often troubled. Unresolved family tensions dating back many years may have reduced confidence on both sides that care giving could work. People may fear it a source of possible damage to the family at large.

And, still another reason, some parents may have reason to fear their children taking advantage of them. Personal history can have taught them to be wary of the motives of their offspring. Long experience of selfishness and self-seeking may justifiably make them suspect what their children might do to them.

And yet, when you look at the situation critically, you wonder how much American individualism is mixed into the attitudes indicated here. Does not the retired woman’s withholding of information about her health crisis come from her seeing herself as a person appropriately left to her own devices? Is that not often the impulse behind the move to retirement communities in Florida or Arizona, to get away from dependence on others?

In many other countries of the world, the issue would not exist. There, members of the same family take it as normal and natural to assume the burdens of one another. I allude to this different approach, not to portray it as the Garden of Eden, but rather to suggest that the typically American attitudes toward independence are not a universal norm.

My basic attitude toward parent care may be thought counter cultural or, perhaps, just old fashioned. However, I like to think of it as grounded in sound anthropology and in enlightened spirituality. Care of other family members in general and parent care in particular, I am convinced, expresses the vital connection we have with one another and can offer precious opportunities for personal growth.

Among my favorite writers on the subject is Mary Pipher. Her insights in “Another Country: Navigating the Emotional Terrain of Our Elders” continue to inspire me. Here’s what she says about taking care of her own parents: “Helping parents get through these hard times is one of our best chances to grow up. We are no longer helpless children; we become truly helpful. If we say no to this challenge, a part of us stays forever young and helpless. Our  own growth is truncated.”

Pipher scores a direct hit, spotting the best reason why parents should go slow in refusing to be a burden to their children. You may be depriving them of a fine opportunity to grow and develop into mature persons. If you deny them care giving opportunities, you may also be giving up the opportunity for yourself to become a more loving person.

Admittedly, the situation is often not as straightforward as I have presented it here. But my main point is to hold up for examination a set of attitudes that frequently work against our own best interests. Interdependence, I am convinced, is the most ennobling approach to life. We need one another, and in the same families our welfare often lies in finding ways to share one another’s burdens.

Richard Griffin