Cornellà de LlobregatAlthough the concept of the third age is obsolete, the improvement in living conditions and medical advances are changing old age, forcing the academy to expand the classification with a fourth age, which would start from the age of 80 . This demographic revolution means that, for the first time, people who are in their seventies or even eighties (socially considered old) have to take care of parents over 90 or even centenarians. The third age taking care of the fourth. And to get an idea of the future, the number of centenarians is growing at a rate of 8%, according to Idescat. It is estimated that there are around 100,000 family carers in Catalonia (90% are women), according to a study by the Suara cooperative. The majority profile is that of a woman aged between 51 and 71 who spends around 14 hours a day.
At Rosa and Teresa Mata’s house, two unmarried sisters aged 79 and 81, respectively, are already thinking about how they will celebrate their mother’s 104th birthday in November, who has lived with them since she was widowed 25 years ago. Then she was younger than her daughters now, she still read and stayed active, but they wanted to prevent her from leaving the house in Sant Pau d’Ordal, where the family is from. Until he turned 100, which is when the sisters place the physical and cognitive decline.
100.000
there are family carers in Catalonia, especially between the ages of 51 and 71
The option of the residence is ruled out because they say that “she would be dead by now” and because between her and two other sisters they manage to take care of their mother and have a few hours to go out with friends or do some activity. At the moment, they have no external help, a very common attitude among caregivers, especially the older ones, explains Lola Romero, a social educator who has dynamized support groups for caregivers. They are generations raised in the mandate to take care of others: siblings, children, husband and now elderly parents. “We are fine, but they have convinced us for teleassistance and dependency,” the two sisters explain. “The doctors tell us that we are starting to need help, maybe we do, but we can still do very well on our own,” they say.
More investment in care
The sector that works with the elderly and the administrations are looking for formulas on how to combine a long-lived society with a good quality of life under the premise that those who want to and can stay at home with decent services and resources. The future Integral Social and Health Agency is following this line, but Esther Roquer, president of the Catalan Society of Gerontology, points out that “if the budget for long-term care is not strengthened [menys de l’1% del PIB espanyol]everything will fall on the family”. The problem is that family change also affects the increase in families without children, single people or the geographical mobility of members.
The Matas say that they are doing very well and are active – “I don’t feel them, the 79”, exclaims Rosa Mata – and they are well organized to wash and dress their mother, very carefully, because she has almost no mobility and they suffer in case they hurt him. Coinciding with the greater dependence on the mother, both go out less, but they have also done it to coordinate: one in the morning and the other in the afternoon and, on Saturday afternoons, they go out folded thanks to the relief that the do the other two sisters, who live on their own.
They tell us that we are starting to need help, but we can still do very well on our own.”
Antonieta Vizcarro, 83, also cares for her 104-year-old mother at home. 12 years ago, her husband was very ill and they settled in the house of the mother, who lived with a sister. At the beginning I was able to go out because since they both had a professional caregiver due to the dependency law, they could add up the hours of service and thus the help was extended. But now she only receives the services of a carer who takes care of getting her up in the mornings because she no longer has enough strength to do it all by herself.
This is his “one time,” he says. “I can’t have a social life and I only use this time to shop and have a coffee with a friend,” she explains. The whole thing is less than an hour. He spends the rest of the day “hanging on his mother, watching TV, cooking for her,” he says. However, she assures that she is satisfied to see that “she is like a queen”. Despite everything, she admits that she already feels “very tired”, her lower back and legs hurt. That’s why he listens to the advice of the family doctor, who suggests asking for a review of the degree of dependency to get the maximum and, thus, to be able to have “help even at night”. At the moment, the pain says that it happens “with a paracetamol”.
I can’t have a social life and I only take advantage of the time when the carer comes in the morning”
Social isolation
The dedication to the care of the elderly leads almost unintentionally to “social isolation” because they lose “support”, says Aida Ribera, senior researcher of the Refit Group and head of research and research at the Pere Virgili Health Park, who with the nurse and researcher Lorena Ramos, sign a study on caregivers of stroke victims. They conclude that family caregivers “hold up the system” and agree with Roquer that changes need to be made. For example, doing more “psychosocial interventions”, says Ramos, to help caregivers take care of themselves, because in many cases “the satisfaction” of taking care of others hides the problems they suffer. A good alternative to increase their “comfort”, points out Ribera, is to introduce artificial intelligence or robotics.
Family caregivers define their self from the person they care for”
Vizcarro also doesn’t want to ask his adult son for help, because he doesn’t want to pass on what he considers his “duty and obligation” to him. This argument has been heard thousands of times by the educator Lola Romero, who indicates how caregivers often understand “the self from the person they care for”, to the point that they ignore their own needs. “We see a feeling of guilt, for not taking care well enough, and at the same time a feeling of anger because they see how they lose their lives,” he explains. This professional also underlines the conflicts that occur between sibling caregivers: the woman is usually the main one, and bets on doing it herself and at home, while the man is mostly in favor of “paying” or, simply, not take care of it
Marta Hinojo, 73 years old, goes to see her centenarian mother at the residence every day. She only misses for the “sacred” holidays in September and when she escapes with her husband to take a trip to “take advantage” of her remaining “healthy” years. When her son made her a grandmother, Hinojo recalls that she was faced with a “moral problem” because she also wanted to spend time on the net.
Old age with autonomy
At 70 years old, Mili Palacios always has his eye on his mother Pascuala Galera, 92 years old. They live a few meters apart, see each other every day and call each other when they wake up and go to sleep as a kind of “life test”, laughs the daughter. Galera still fends for herself, and with the help of the walker she goes in and out to meet her friends in the Cornellà neighborhood where she has lived for decades and go for coffee at the market. The truth, Palacios reports, is that the mother “doesn’t put up much of a fight” and, for now, is there to sort out the pills she has to take and make her big purchases.
Now, despite the autonomy that his mother still retains, Palacios is reluctant to go on vacation, even for a week. She suffers too much, and this is supported by her daughter Gemma, who is also a regular at her grandmother’s house. “I scold her because she’s too much for me, I want her to leave and be happy,” comments Galera, sitting on the sofa on her ground floor. It is unsuccessful: the daughter makes it her life’s goal to “keep her active” and, above all, to walk for an hour every day.
