Realising your parents are aging. How did you cope?

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Looking for any perspectives of people that have been through that moment in their life when they realise that their parents are starting to show proper signs of age, especially if it seemed to happen quickly? My mum had a fall this week and has broken both of her arms. She also had a fall six weeks ago. She’s 73. To me that still feels relatively young, but she has a couple of underlying issues like osteoporosis. Finding it quite a slap in the face of reality, especially because I’m surrounded by friends and we all have toddlers and all of their parents are coming to help all the time, playing in the park, doing babysitting. The fact is my parents are just a bit older and I’ve really noticed a shift between their capabilities in their late sixties to how they are in their mid 70s. What did you do to help them and support them but also how did you process it for yourself?

It makes me feel like a little girl even though I need to be a grown-up in the room. I guess I feel scared that this is the beginning of the end. I’m also five months pregnant and just terrified all the time anyway! I feel so sorry for my mum and struggles with the NHS mean it’s not been a very dignified few days…

I'm really sorry about your mum.

My advice is one day at a time, one thing at a time.

Worrying does not do anything but make your present moment terrible.

Aging is a grief process
But it is also wonderful, full of happiness still
It's just changing.

Paying attention to significant changes. A big one was that relatively minor unpleasant things (a scammer type person coming to the door for example) upset my mum far more than it would have done previously. Once I’d seen that, I noticed that she seemed to be spending a lot of time worrying about the grandchildren.

At that point I started to deliberately make our phone calls as light and cheerful as I could, with positive news about the gc too. It was the first shift I really noticed in who held the responsibility in our relationship. My mum wasn’t a shoulder to cry on any more.

My parents never made it to 70, but we had a hell of a time with PIL. Long story.
Make sure you have POA for both of them, and that all paperwork, passwords, funeral wishes etc are up to date. This is essential.
As time goes on, think about gradually increasing external help as appropriate, cleaners, gardeners, taxis, carers, local handymen, etc. Online shopping and prescription delivery. Consider having things set up/discussed just in case to avoid a crisis. Don’t always be the go-to. Things can turn at the drop of a hat and a ‘cross that bridge’ mentality will not serve you well. It’s kind of like a role reversal but you must have boundaries!
What are their plans for coping?
If your DM has osteoporosis make sure you have a DEXA scan. It has a strong hereditary component.

I’m in a similar position, you don’t say how close you are geographically but the worst thing for me is that I’m really far away which is actually giving me a lot of anxiety. I cried to my husband today because I’ve not organised myself to go before Christmas and I know she’ll be disappointed. I’m spending Xmas this year with MIL who is 10 years older but in much better health.
This past year she’s been pretty ill and I’ve been there a few times but it doesn’t feel like enough. My older children are in an exam year so they’ve not been at all and she misses them. So am I coping, not really just feel guilty. My parents are divorced too and my dad’s on his own so I worry about him too being lonely and far away although, he has a great circle of friends.

POA is essential. Gardner/cleaner/make house as easy to manage as possible. Downsize to live near public transport/drs/shops etc so if they can’t drive they are not isolated.

I sometimes think that it was better when we had kids early 20’s and grandparents were 40 somethings…it’s the curse of the sandwich generation, young kids and declining parents.

One parent died shortly after turning 69, the other has some odd personality traits. Neither were able to help.

Work on resilience and the expectation of declining health as the years go on. Acceptance, we cannot control life.

You need to get the legal side of things sorted out. PoAs, Wills, DNRs and have the discussion about long term care. How much involvement can you/do you want? How do they see the future and what is your role (and that of any siblings) in that? What provision will be needed if you are unwilling and/or unable to help?

Presumably your mother's osteoporosis is being actively treated? Who is advocating for her? IME, the elderly tend to be ignored or at least not treated proactively by the NHS once they get past a certain age.

Agree with all of this. My parents are late 80s / early 90s but still living at home. One is well, the other not. I live several hours away. There is a lot of coming to terms with the fact that things will escalate.

Is your mum on the accrete stuff now to strengthen her bones? Poor soul. Broken bones hurt. She needs to take vitamin c too to help wirh absorption of the vitamin D and calcium in the accrete.

when mine fell she had another two falls within a matter of weeks and the downhill spiral just started there. It’s like a race to the bottom now. There’s no going back sadly so I just have to support her as best I can. one minute she was fine. Then wham and shes so frail. Once they lose their muscles they don’t regained them. Or weight. Mine is so skinny now. Sad.