Guardian readers shared how caring for ageing parents with siblings tested – and sometimes broke – family bonds
When Katrina, 60 (who withheld her last name for privacy), moved in with her family in Mexico during Covid, it made sense for her to manage her aging parents’ medical care; she’s a nurse. Her sister, who has an MBA, took care of the administrative tasks. It was the first time the family had all lived together since Katrina was in high school. The lockdown was a “very challenging, wonderful” time, she says.
At first, the division of responsibilities between the two sisters worked well. But slowly, Katrina started to feel there was “scope creep”. Instead of staying in her administrative lane, her sister started weighing in more and more on Katrina’s management of medical matters.
“I got to see a side of my sister that I don’t particularly like,” Katrina says. “It’s probably the same for her.”
When their parents died soon after, it was “next level stress on top of grief on top of exhaustion”, Katrina recalls. Although she feels that she and her sister did an excellent job of caring for their parents, her relationship with her sister has never fully recovered. “We never did a debrief, and there’s a lot hanging out there,” she says.
