When I Married My Mother

Jo Maeder left the life of a New York City DJ to care for her aging mother. She moved out of the city, bought a home in Greensboro, North Carolina for the two of them to live in together, and unwittingly joined a growing trend of intergenerational households. The latest census shows a 67 percent increase in the number of parents living with their adult children.

In her upcoming book, When I Married My Mother, Jo writes about her decision to leave her fast-paced city lifestyle to spend three years as her mother’s in-home caregiver. She talks about the struggles and safety hazards that come along with a chronic hoarder, the emotional difficulties of living with a loved one who has dementia, as well as what it’s like to “marry” your mother.

I wanted to share an interview with Jo since her experience is not only close to my heart, but also impacts many of us living in the “sandwich generation.”

I’m not trying to lay a guilt trip on anyone. This is not the right solution for a lot of people. If you can’t take it on, you can’t take it on. Sometimes the parent is just too far into dementia or has had a debilitating stroke so it’s not feasible. Sometimes the parent doesn’t want you to… 

There’s no one-size-fits-all answer, but try to talk about it before you need to. Look into a Long Term Care or Home Health Care insurance policy. They may not be as expensive as you think. My mother got a modest one in her late seventies that was ultimately extremely helpful. It’s hard to do this. We’re all in denial that we’re going to die or will need a lot of care before we do. 

My New York therapist thought I might have Rescuer Syndrome and that my mother could not be rescued. But I felt, because of a run of bad luck in my own life at that time, that we were rescuing each other. We both left our former lives to form a new one together. My “sacrifice” ended up being anything but that. I gained far more than I lost. 

Anywhere from bad to catastrophic. A lot of companies offer day care, maternity leave, and time off for family emergencies, but elder care is very different. For one thing, you have no idea how long you’ll be needed. It could easily be years. There’s the “anticipatory grief” you feel that is worse, in many ways, than the actual passing of a loved one. Losing a parent is unbelievably emotional and stressful. Even if you had the most understanding company in the world—and only about 3% have any kind of elder care benefits in place—how could you do your job well? …The bottom line is you have to handle your finances wisely from the time you go out on your own and save, save, save. You never know what life will throw at you.

Oh, but I did have a personal life. A very rich and interesting one. It was just completely different from the one I’d had in New York where I was the “Samantha” of my gal pals. Some of them claim I turned into Charlotte! It was effortless, really. I needed to take a break from dating more than I realized. 

They’re very complicated and very simple. But if you’re not right with your Mama, you probably won’t be right with anyone.

Jo Maeder is the author of the upcoming book When I Married My Mother. She was formerly a DJ (the “Rock and Roll Madame”) on K-ROCK in New York City and her writing has appeared in the New York Times and More magazine.