"As I walked the streets, did interviews, conducted business, I took to wondering which of the middle-aged people I encountered were quietly struggling to cope with their own crisis. How many of them felt utterly out of their depth? How many others, having come through an ordeal, had experience that they had no ready opportunity to share? According to the National Alliance for Caregiving, about 50 million Americans are providing some care for an adult family member. I was swimming in an invisidle crowd of caregivers every day, but, like streams of photons, we passed through each other."This passage comes from The Atlantic writer Jonathan Rauch in a thought-provoking piece with which dementia caregivers surely can relate. It's called "Letting Go of My Father."
It tells his personal story. It also shows a parallel between today's invisible caregivers and the endemic lonliness and boredom among yesterday's housewives that Betty Friedan described as "the problem that has no name."
Anyway, Rauch's essay is a lengthy narrative, what we in journalism used to call "a good read," and it's more than worthwhile, especially if you are a caregiver.
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