The Rational Basis® of Happiness Podcast

The Selfish Path to Romance. Download chapter one for free at DrKenner.com and at Amazon.com.

This last week with Dad, it's been a living hell. When I'm there, I feel like my territory is being violated; when I'm not, I'm worried about what he's up to. A nervous wreck. You don't still have the brochures from those rest homes, do you?

Do you really think that's necessary?

I'm afraid I do.

I don't have my life anymore.

You don't suppose there's a chance that you and Maris could...?

Dear God, no.

One email wrote to me and said, "I am sure that you will never discuss this email openly on one of your shows." She was walking through her living room, picking up my show, listening to it, and she heard me say something. Now, you can't take it out of context, but she heard me say something that she thought meant, "Dump your elderly parents. You've got to have a life, and if they have aches and pains, then put them in a nursing home. Get rid of them, enjoy your life."

So she wrote me a very lovely, tasteful letter—a very strong letter, but very tasteful—saying, "Dr. Kenner, I know you're a professional and you've studied in the books, but you've got to have compassion for others, and you don't learn that in any book."

So she's assuming that I don’t have compassion for others, and she’s got a view about me that is woefully mistaken, but she’s right on one point.

Here is a piece of a longer email. She said, "Dear Dr. Kenner, the one thing our young society today is missing is compassion for others. Without compassion for others, what do we have? We have a society of people who never experience inner peace and satisfaction. They are too busy in their me world."

Okay, see if you picture the people kind of polishing their nails. Now, I get my nails done. You picture, you know, just somebody that's a total narcissist, totally me only. And she says, "Sacrifice builds strong character."

Okay, I fully disagree with that, but I'm coming back to that in a minute. Think about what you think: does your sacrifice in life build strong character, or strong resentment, bitterness, and envy?

Next, she says, "I am 63 years old. My dad is 90 and has Alzheimer's," so that’s a tragic situation, "and I am his caretaker. It’s a tough job, and the sacrifices are endless, but at least he has the love of family and is not stuck in a nursing home where he would only exist."

So let's take a closer look at that for a moment. The sacrifices are endless. You wake up in the morning. You have to feed him, you have to bathe your own dad. You have to deal with the fact that he's lost his mind. He's no longer your dad anymore. He doesn't recognize you at times, but maybe, well, if he's 90, I'm guessing it's advanced Alzheimer's. He doesn't know who you are, so he's a shell of the man he used to be. His mind is gone. He's got a lot of plaques. He's got a lot of the plaques on the brains. The old brain has the Alzheimer plaques, and so it's not really your dad anymore, but you feel like a good person.

The sacrifices are endless, so think of the visuals of what it's like to live for maybe 10 years, 15 years with this family member, if the Alzheimer's has been a very slow process. Now, you're 63 years old; that's a chunk of your life. And then she continues in her email, "And thank God we did not think of ourselves first in this situation. I was taught by my mother and father, whose education was sixth grade, that the best gift you can give another person is the gift of yourself. And guilt has nothing to do with it. It's called compassion, something that could never be taught by a textbook."

"I just hope and pray someday that your family is loving and compassionate and does not just put you—" that's me, Dr. Kenner—"somewhere among strangers to satisfy their own needs. That would be terrible. Thank you for listening. Mary."

So Mary, I want to take two of those points. There are many points that I could talk about, and I've already started to point one: "Sacrifice builds strong character." Think of people who've said, "I never do anything for myself. I've just done for my husband. I just do for my kids, I just do for my relatives. I just do for the church, I just do for the temple, I just do for the community, I just do for the nation, I just do for the environment."

Think of what that does when you abandon yourself. Would you want a very young child who says, "Oh, Mommy, I want to go to the playground. I want to take tap dancing or ballet. I want to take tennis, mommy," and think of saying, "No, you need to sacrifice your values." None of us—the healthy ones of us—would want to do that to our kids. We want to see them pursuing their values. Well, I think the kid in you never grows up. I would love to see you continue to pursue your values.

Now, there are tragic situations, for example, if we have a handicapped kid, where we can't just toss the kid out and move on, where we have an obligation, a responsibility. But I would hope that it would motivate us to become more successful. There's a very famous opera singer who had a handicapped child, and what she did was she became so passionate about her career, and it earned her a lot of money, so it gave her some respite from the child, and then she was still able to have her caretaking responsibilities and have a life for herself. Now, not everybody is that skilled or that ambitious, but that alternative is open to you.

So here's what I would think—

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I imagine myself being her dad, the Alzheimer's patient, but with one additional feature: that I'm aware that you're doing this for me. I would be horrified. And let's say it's not you, but my two kids. My husband and I have already taken out long-term health insurance so that my kids can afford a nursing home for us. I have so much compassion for my kids that I don't want to see them unnecessarily torture themselves by cleaning my depends, by cleaning up after me, by having to get in the shower and shower their own mother, day in and day out, and feed me when food is drooling down my face. People are trained for that, and they get paid for that.

Yes, the nursing home will not be as nice as home, but it may even be better, because family members burn out, just like everybody, and they may feel resentment, and they may take it out on me. That happens all the time. I see it in therapy with caretakers coming in saying, "I'm burnt out. I'm yelling at my parents, or I just can't stand it anymore."

Alzheimer's is very difficult. It's harder on the caretaker than the Alzheimer's patient in many ways; they're losing their mind. They're not the same individual. So even if you had the best parent, I think you need respite, and I don't value self-sacrifice. Now, if your alternatives are limited, I would still hope that you would have all the family members who would pitch in. But if you have the capacity and you're not looking for the inheritance, to spend the money to liberate yourself, you can still visit them anytime you want.

In the nursing home, my mother-in-law had an incapacitating stroke. She was a tall, heavy woman. No way I could lift her. She was in a nursing home. She couldn't speak, she couldn't walk, and the people were lovely there. So you assume that all nursing homes are equal and that they're all bad. That's not fair to nursing homes. Many of them have lovely people. In fact, I personally thanked each one with a lovely note when she finally passed away. They were lovely.

So I would take a closer look at that and see if you wouldn't want your father to have the ability to have compassion for you, to love your own life, and to still visit him but to love your own life.

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