What’s different about dating in your 50s, compared with your 20s and 30s?
The biggest difference is you have some experience. You already have a love story inside you. You’re a lot freer. You’ve completed your adult tasks, which are to raise a family and establish yourself in the community. In your 20s, 30s, and 40s, you have a really long to-do list. By the time you get into your 60s and 70s, you have a kind of confidence that comes with experience. You are freer to define the kind of life you want to lead. That’s a wonderful bonus for relationships. You put a premium not on scoring with someone, but on connecting with someone and being who you really are. When you’re young, there’s a lot of pressure to find your mate and settle down. Once you’re in your 50s and 60s, you don’t have that pressure. The urgency is to make friends. You’re dating for fun.

How do you balance commitments to a deceased spouse with beginning new relationship?
People who decouple again after having had a relationship before are able to embrace the past relationship and then move on. I think one of the dangers is that second relationships feel that they are in competition with first relationships. The man and the woman need to be very comfortable acknowledging that each person had a past life. The key is to have confidence in who you are in the relationship right now. Remember the past, but also don’t let it weight you down. 

How do kids from previous relationships come into play? 
You redefine your relationship with your adult children. They are no longer a dependent child, but someone who is also an adult who you can be very close to. They may think it’s cool that Grandma goes out on a date or [that] adult children may be protective. They want to make sure that their mom is not going to get hurt or their dad is not going to be taken for a ride. Adult children are usually happy that their parents, who have become single from a death or a divorce, are going on dates and have someone special in their lives.  

Do baby boomers and seniors frequently look up old flames from high school or college?
This happens quite frequently. Sometimes people wonder what has happened to someone they had cared about so many years ago. Sometimes it is part of a reunion of a college class. Sometimes people look them up with the Internet. You go to your hometown for a funeral and you run into that person’s family. It’s a way that older people like to write their narrative of relations and make a coherent story 

What dating mistakes are baby boomers and seniors making?
In the research that I did, finding a partner and being part of a couple is not enough. You really need a network of friends and family to enrich your life. You should have about eight or 10 people in your circle. If you get below three, you may become quite isolated.

Caregiving takes many forms. Many of us help older, sick, or disabled family members and friends every day. We know we are helping, but we don’t think of ourselves as caregivers. We are glad to do this and feel rewarded by it, but if the demands are heavy, over time we can also become exhausted and stressed. We think we should be able to handle caregiving roles on top of busy work and family schedules and begin to feel guilty and depressed as our stamina wanes.

About 44 million Americans provide 37 billion hours of unpaid, “informal” care each year for adult family members and friends with chronic illnesses or conditions that prevent them from handling daily activities such as bathing, managing medications or preparing meals on their own. Family caregivers, particularly women, provide over 75% of caregiving support in the United States. In 2007, the estimated economic value of family caregivers’ unpaid contributions was at least $375 billion, which is how much it would cost to replace that care with paid services.¹

Caregiving: A Universal Occupation

Who are Caregivers?

The short answer is most of us, at some point in our lives. Caregivers are daughters, wives, husbands, sons, grandchildren, nieces, nephews, partners and friends. While some people receive care from paid caregivers, most rely on unpaid assistance from families, friends and neighbors.

Caregivers manage a wide range of responsibilities. In your family, for example, are you the person who:

• Buys groceries, cooks, cleans house or does laundry for someone who needs special help doing these things?
• Helps a family member get dressed, take a shower and take medicine?
• Helps with transferring someone in and out of bed, helps with physical therapy, injections, feeding tubes or other medical procedures?
• Makes medical appointments and drives to the doctor and drugstore?
• Talks with the doctors, care managers and others to understand what needs to be done?
• Spends time at work handling a crisis or making plans to help a family member who is sick?
• Is the designated “on-call” family member for problems?

In small doses, these jobs are manageable. But having to juggle competing caregiving demands with the demands of your own life on an ongoing basis can be quite a challenge.

With the 65+ age group expected to double to 70 million people by 2030,² family caregivers increasingly provide care for aging parents, siblings, and friends, most of whom have one or more chronic conditions³ and who wish to remain in their own homes and communities as they age.⁴ Others belong to the “sandwich generation,” caring for children and parents at the same time.

Caregiving roles and demands are impacted by a number of other factors, including:

• Type of illness. Caring for someone with Alzheimer’s disease, other dementias, or other brain-impairing disorders can be more stressful than caring for someone with a physical impairment. Caring for someone with a cognitive disorder can be a 24/7 job due to the unpredictability of the care recipient’s behavior.⁵
• Long-distance caregiving. Long-distance caregiving is usually defined as care provided by a caregiver living more than an hour away from the care recipient. Caring from a distance is difficult both emotionally and logistically, and is most common in situations where adult children and their parents do not live in the same area. In these cases, the caregiver’s role is not as much “hands-on” as it is gathering information about available resources, coordinating services and putting together a “team” of family, friends and paid help that can meet the care recipient’s needs.
• Urban versus rural settings. Caregivers living in rural settings face unique challenges. These include fewer available formal services, fewer physicians and health education services, transportation difficulties, weather problems in winter, geographic distance and isolation.⁶
• Different cultural approaches to caregiving. The United States’ great diversity means that families bring their own histories, traditions and rituals to caregiving. In many cultures, there are family expectations about the caregiving roles of adult children; this is especially true in cultures where daughters or daughters-in-law are expected to assume the primary caregiver role for aging parents.

For some people, caregiving occurs gradually over time. For others, it can happen overnight. Caregivers may be full- or part-time; live with their loved one or provide care from a distance. Caregivers provide a wide range of services, from simple help such as grocery shopping, to complex medical procedures. For the most part, friends, neighbors, and most of all, families, provide–without pay–the vast majority of healthcare in this country.

First Steps: Help for New Caregivers

It is easy to become overwhelmed as a new caregiver. Five steps that can help are:

• Start with a diagnosis. Learning about a family member’s diagnosis helps caregivers understand the disease process and plan ahead realistically.
• Talk about finances and healthcare wishes. Having these conversations can be difficult, but completing Durable Powers of Attorney for finances and healthcare can help relieve anxiety and better prepare for the future.
• Consider inviting family and close friends to come together and discuss the care needed. If possible, it’s helpful to include the care recipient in this meeting. This meeting gives caregivers a chance to say what they need, plan for care and ask others for assistance.
• Take advantage of community resources such as Meals on Wheels and adult day programs. These resources help relieve the workload and offer a break. Look for caregiver educational programs that will increase knowledge and confidence.
• Find support. The most important thing is for caregivers to not become isolated as they take on more responsibility and as social life moves into the background. Online and in-person groups can be very helpful in connecting with others in the same circumstances. Caregivers can call Family Caregiver Alliance at (800) 445-8106 to learn about local services, or visit www.caregiver.org, and click on “Family Care Navigator.”

Caregiving in the U.S.

Data from many studies and reports reveal the following information about caregivers:

• The “typical” U.S. caregiver is a 46-year-old woman who works outside the home and spends more than 20 hours per week providing unpaid care to her mother.⁷ Most caregivers are married or living with a partner.⁸
• While caregivers can be found across the age span, the majority of caregivers are middle-aged (35-64 years old).⁹
• Most caregivers are employed. Among caregivers age 50-64 years old, an estimated 60% are working full or part-time.¹⁰
• Studies show that ethnic minority caregivers provide more care than their white counter-parts¹¹ and report worse physical health than white caregivers.¹²
• Many caregivers of older people are themselves elderly. Of those caring for someone aged 65+, the average age of caregivers is 63 years with one third of these caregivers in fair to poor health.¹³
• Nearly half of caregivers provide fewer than eight hours of care per week, while nearly one in five provide more than 40 hours of care per week.¹⁴ A statewide California study of caregivers of adults with cognitive disorders such as Alzheimer’s showed that caregivers provided an average of 84 hours of care per week, the equivalent of more than two full-time jobs.¹⁵ Older caregivers often spend the most hours providing care¹⁶ and the amount of time spent caring increases substantially as cognitive impairment worsens.¹⁷
• Caregiving can last from less than a year to more than 40 years. In a 2003 study, caregivers were found to spend an average of 4.3 years providing care. Older caregivers (50+) are more likely to have been caregiving for more than 10 years (17%).¹⁸
• Most caregivers live near the people they care for. Eighty-three percent of caregivers care for relatives, with 24% living with the care recipient, 61% living up to one hour away, and 15%—or about 7,000,000 caregivers—living a one- to two- hour drive or more away.¹⁹

Effects of Caregiving

Impact on Physical and Emotional Health

Recent medical advances, shorter hospital stays, increasing life spans with better management of chronic illnesses, limited discharge planning, a shortage of homecare workers, and the expansion of home care technology have increased the caregiving responsibilities of families. Family caregivers are being asked to shoulder greater burdens for longer periods of time. In addition to more complex care, conflicting demands of jobs and family, increasing economic pressure, and the physical and emotional demands of long-term caregiving can result in major health impacts on caregivers.²⁰

Over all, caregivers who experience the greatest emotional stress tend to be female. They are at risk for high levels of stress, frustration, anxiety, exhaustion and anger, depression, increased use of alcohol or other substances, reduced immune response, poor physical health and more chronic conditions, neglecting their own care and have higher mortality rates compared to noncaregivers.²¹

In addition, most caregivers are ill-prepared for their role and provide care with little or no support²²; yet more than one-third of caregivers continue to provide intense care to others while suffering from poor health themselves.²³ An influential factor in a caregiver’s decision to place an impaired relative in a long-term care facility is the family caregiver’s own physical health.²⁴

Financial Issues

Long term caregiving has significant financial consequences for caregivers, particularly for women. Informal caregivers personally lose about $659,139 over a lifetime: $25,494 in Social Security benefits; $67,202 in pension benefits; and $566,443 in forgone wages.

Caregivers face the loss of income of the care recipient, loss of their own income if they reduce their work hours or leave their jobs, loss of employer-based medical benefits, shrinking of savings to pay caregiving costs, and a threat to their retirement income due to fewer contributions to pensions and other retirement vehicles.²⁵

Work and Eldercare

Caregiving also has a substantial impact on business. Lost productivity due to informal caregiving costs businesses $17.1 billion annually.²⁶ Absenteeism, replacing employees who quit in order to provide care and other caregiving-related activities also have serious financial consequences to employers. For instance:

• The cost to businesses to replace women caregivers who quit their jobs because of their caregiving responsibilities has been estimated at $3.3 billion.
• Absenteeism among women caregivers due to caregiving responsibilities costs businesses almost $270 million.
• The cost to businesses because of partial absenteeism (e. g., extended lunch breaks, leaving work early or arriving late) due to women’s caregiving has been estimated at $327 million. Caregiving-related workday interruptions add another $3.8 billion to the burden borne by businesses.²⁷

Working caregivers often suffer many work-related difficulties due to their “second careers” as caregivers. Sixty-seven percent of family caregivers report conflicts between caregiving and employment, resulting in reduced work hours or unpaid leave.²⁸

The importance of eldercare is now recognized by a growing number of employers, with movement toward more flexible work schedules, “cafeteria style” benefits, in-house support groups, and education, information, and referrals provided through employee assistance programs.

Policy changes have also supported family caregivers. Companies with 50 or more employees must comply with the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA), which allows for up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave to care for a seriously ill parent, spouse or child, while protecting job security. Smaller firms can use the FMLA guidelines to provide support for individual employees. Paid Family Leave (PFL) provides workers with a maximum of six weeks of partial pay each year while taking time off from work to care for a seriously ill parent, child, spouse or registered domestic partner, and has been instituted in several states, including California. Policy changes that could also benefit family caregivers include paid sick leave that can be used by employees for themselves or to care for family members and expanding FMLA beyond immediate family members to include care for siblings, in-laws and grandparents.²⁹

Legal Issues

It is important to make legal preparations in the event a parent becomes cognitively impaired. Typical concerns include who will manage the confused person’s money, who will make important health care decisions and how to plan for long-term care.

An attorney can help plan for the financial aspects of long-term care needs, assist with surrogate decision-making tools such as the durable power of attorney (DPA) and a durable power of attorney for health care (DPAHC), and provide guidance in obtaining a conservatorship should the care recipient lack the capacity to make decisions. A conservatorship provides the legal authority to manage a person’s finances, estate, personal affairs, assets and medical care.³⁰

The Need for Support

Because of the multi-faceted role that family and informal caregivers play, they need a range of support services to remain healthy, improve their caregiving skills and remain in their caregiving role. Support services include information, assistance, counseling, respite, home modifications or assistive devices, caregiver and family counseling, and support groups. While many services are available through local government agencies, service organizations, or faith-based organizations, employers’ programs also can mitigate the impact that caregiving can have on workers.

Services that improve caregiver depression, anxiety and anger benefit both the caregiver and the care recipient.³¹ Evidence also shows that caregiver support delays or prevents nursing home placement; people with moderate dementia have been able to defer placement by nearly 1.5 years when their family members receive caregiver services, including counseling, information and ongoing support.³²

Policy Implications

Family caregiving is the backbone of the United States’ long term care system as well as the core of what sustains frail elders and adults with disabilities, yet caregivers often make major sacrifices to help loved ones remain in their homes. A federal investment in family caregiver support is needed now more than ever.

A national agenda is needed that:

• Supports the National Family Caregiver Support Program (NFCSP) to provide caregivers with information and assistance, counseling, support groups, respite, caregiver training and limited supplemental services.
• Funds Lifespan Respite Care so that family caregivers can take a break from the demands of providing constant care
• Expands the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) and paid leave policies to increase financial support for workers providing essential care for family members.
• Promotes financial incentives, career advancement, geriatric education and training, and long-term care policies to expand the geriatric care workforce.
• Enacts legislation providing refundable tax credits for family caregivers to defray long-term care costs and compensate for expenses that family and informal caregivers at all income levels incur.
• Strengthen Social Security by recognizing the work of family caregivers who leave the workforce to provide full-time support and care for an ill, disabled or an elderly family member.

Conclusion

With the dramatic aging of the population, we will be relying even more on families to provide care for their aging parents, relatives and friends for months and years at a time. Yet, the enormous pressures and risks of family caregiving—burnout, compromised health, depression and depletion of financial resources—are a reality of daily life for millions of American families and pose great strain on family caregivers, many of whom are struggling to balance work and family responsibilities.

Families need information and their own support services to preserve their critical role as caregivers, but frequently they do not know where to turn for help. When they do seek assistance, many community agencies cannot provide adequate supports due to funding constraints and out-dated policies. The federal government can help by taking steps to ensure that all family caregivers have access to caregiver assistance and to practical, high quality, and affordable home and community-based services. These are tough economic times, but supporting family caregivers is one of the most cost-effective long-term care investments we can make. As long as caregivers are able to provide care, they are often able to delay costly nursing home placements and reduce reliance on programs like Medicaid.

Great Ideas for Senior Citizens on Preventing Identity Theft

For the sixth consecutive year, identity theft surpassed construction, credit card and debt collection fraud as the most prevalent form of consumer fraud, according to the Federal Trade Commission, which received 255,000 identity theft complaints last year.Limiting exposure of personal information is the best way to protect yourself from fraud

Checks:

● Use your initials and last name when ordering printed checks. A check forger won’t know how you sign your checks, but your bank will.

● Do not have your home phone number or Social Security number printed on your checks. Use your work phone number. Use a post office box or work address instead of your home address.

● Order new checks from your bank and pick them up at the bank, rather than having them sent to your home mailbox.

Credit cards

● When paying credit card bills, write only the last four digits of the account number in the check memo line.

● Do not sign the back of your credit card. Instead write, “Photo ID required.”

● Photocopy both sides of your driver’s license, credit cards and other important contents of your wallet. In the event it is stolen, you’ll know exactly what is missing.

● Keep a list of your credit card numbers and their toll-free customer service numbers so you can cancel cards quickly if lost or stolen. Keep the list in a safe place in your home, not in your wallet.

Social Security Number

● Do not carry your Social Security card in your wallet. Memorize the number and put the original card in a safe place.

● If you believe your Social Security number has been compromised, contact the Social Security Administration fraud line 800-269-0271.

PINs and Passwords

● Do not write your PIN on the back of the card or on anything else in your wallet.

● Use different PINs for each debit and credit card. If you have too many to remember, consider reducing the number of cards you carry in your wallet.

● Do not use easily available information, like your birth date, phone number or part of your Social Security number, for PINS and passwords.

Mail and Trash

● Use post office collection boxes for outgoing mail, rather than your home mail box.

● Shred any trash that may contain personal information, including charge receipts, credit applications, insurance forms, medical statements, checks and bank statements, expired credit and debit cards and direct mail credit offers.

● You can opt not to receive direct mail credit offers by calling 888-567-8688.

If your wallet is stolen, you should immediately:

● File a police report to document the theft and the wallet contents.

● Contact one of the national credit reporting organizations (listed below) to have a fraud alert placed on your name and Social Security number. The organization you contact is required to contact the other two. If the thief’s purchases initiate a credit check, the credit reporting organization can alert the merchant. Placing a fraud alert entitles you to free copies of your credit reports.

● Equifax 800-525-6285
● Experian 888-397-3742
● Trans Union 800-680-7289

● Close all accounts for missing credit cards. Check your credit reports for accounts opened fraudulently.

● File a complaint with the Federal Trade Commission, which maintains a database of identity theft cases, online at www.consumer.gov/idtheft. This database assists law enforcement agencies and helps the FTC learn more about identity theft.

● Notify your bank if your wallet contained a checkbook or debit/ATM cards.