My mother’s voice was calm, even more measured than usual.

“Your father’s breathing tube came off last night while he was sleeping,” she said over the phone from Portland. “I had to take him to the hospital. He’s doing fine.”

This was almost three decades ago, and I still vividly recall not being surprised that SOMETHING had happened. My dad had been going downhill for years, bedeviled by a lifetime of smoking cigarettes (up to three packs a day) that began when he was a young teenager growing up on a farm in Greeley, Colo. A few years earlier, prior to him being diagnosed with emphysema, we realized just how sick he was when he had to pause to walk even a few feet. He spent his last few years afraid to go almost anywhere because he was terrified of running out of oxygen. He was literally tied to that tank.

Rob Smith, editor at Seattle magazine

Photo by Tate Carlson

This issue of Seattle magazine is about finding meaning in aging. It’s also about the realities many of us face in caring for aging parents, siblings, or other family members. The stories on caregivers, for instance, are nothing short of heart-wrenching.

A 2022 study from the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society found that the so-called “sandwich generation” — family members across the United States who care for aging parents and children simultaneously — numbers 2.5 million. Yet that’s just roughly a quarter of people who care for mostly parents but also other family members. It’s a staggering statistic.

In my father’s case, he had a similar episode three years later that cost him his life at age 76. I was living in Seattle before he died, and made trips down to Portland at least two weekends a month to help my mother. I never thought of it as a sacrifice, though I didn’t have kids at the time.

“I remember taking you to your weekly allergy shots,” he (dad) said. “Now you’re taking me to doctor’s appointments. Kind of ironic, isn’t it?”

My dad — a tough World War II veteran who was the first in his family to attend college (on the GI Bill that provided educational opportunities to help soldiers readjust to civilian life) — once reflected on our new relationship. “I remember taking you to your weekly allergy shots,” he said. “Now you’re taking me to doctor’s appointments. Kind of ironic, isn’t it?”

Shortly before my father died his doctor told us that he was in excellent shape. “His lungs just gave out,” he said. “I see this more and more. If he hadn’t smoked, he’d probably be in great health.” That didn’t make my mother, brother, or myself angry. It was his life, and he’d always owned it. He never complained. We never felt put upon. He even once told me that he very much enjoyed cigarettes, and understood the risks. Even near death, he was teaching me. Always teaching.

My brother and I also later looked after my stubborn mother, who refused to move out of the house we grew up in, eventually fell down a staircase, and broke her hip. She was also one tough woman, enduring strokes, cancer, and a heart attack. She spent the last 11 or so years of her life in an assisted-living facility. Even then, we had to remain vigilant: It didn’t take us long to realize that family involvement led to better care.

I’ve talked with other family caregivers numerous times since, and the same message always resonates: Yes, it’s a burden, but your instincts take over. You just do what you have to do.