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Who Will Care for ‘Kinless’ Seniors?

Who Will Care for ‘Kinless’ Seniors? https://nyt...
stirring dingle berry
  12/06/22
I'm 70 years old, in multi-faceted poor health, and living t...
stirring dingle berry
  12/06/22
wow this is sad
Vivacious sooty business firm clown
  12/07/22
:(
Contagious Old Irish Cottage
  12/07/22
...
stirring dingle berry
  12/07/22
"I find it a constant irritation that politicians and &...
arousing kitty
  12/07/22
Gas all
zombie-like pale stage
  12/07/22
New Yorker constantly terrified of death and irritated by an...
Doobsian blathering plaza
  12/07/22
...
stirring dingle berry
  12/08/22
no, obviously. and that people like this are allowed to exer...
Mischievous Space Idea He Suggested
  12/08/22
...
arousing kitty
  12/08/22
"Sometimes it's a sober, rational, life choice based on...
Brass box office legend
  12/07/22
Now let's see the studies of "elderly" (who made u...
stirring dingle berry
  12/06/22
Wow
Doobsian blathering plaza
  12/07/22
Wow indeed! I didn't know we had poasters in their 80s!
stirring dingle berry
  12/07/22
...
Lascivious Twinkling Background Story
  12/07/22
...
stirring dingle berry
  12/07/22
...
High-end Location Patrolman
  12/07/22
...
Mischievous Space Idea He Suggested
  12/08/22
I am in the same boat, though the water hasn't risen yet. Ap...
stirring dingle berry
  12/06/22
...
stirring dingle berry
  12/06/22
Bit of an admission here re abortion
abusive trailer park
  12/07/22
...
stirring dingle berry
  12/07/22
...
stirring dingle berry
  12/07/22
...
Cream glittery senate tattoo
  12/07/22
There was an article a couple of years back -- in the New Yo...
Lascivious Twinkling Background Story
  12/07/22
It's a darling minidoc topic for Westerners to cover body cl...
High-end Location Patrolman
  12/07/22
This will dominate XO posts within 20 yrs
mind-boggling wild pit trust fund
  12/07/22
...
stirring dingle berry
  12/07/22
Grandparentmos STYLING on the nokidmos
Chrome hospital
  12/07/22
“Any bros in their 70s successfully started over in a ...
Grizzly Alpha
  12/07/22
"Possible to make new friends as a 78 year old widower?...
Doobsian blathering plaza
  12/07/22
...
stirring dingle berry
  12/08/22
...
Chrome hospital
  12/08/22
...
stirring dingle berry
  12/08/22
...
Mischievous Space Idea He Suggested
  12/08/22
...
Costumed 180 Base
  12/08/22
Make them food
Heady Poppy Dopamine Parlor
  12/07/22
Like, Meals on Wheels? Or Soylent Green?
High-end Location Patrolman
  12/07/22
ZOG destroyed the western family, the community, the nation,...
big-titted spectacular queen of the night lodge
  12/07/22
Pretty dope, imo
stimulating crackhouse ladyboy
  12/07/22
...
Jet market personal credit line
  12/07/22
...
Mischievous Space Idea He Suggested
  12/08/22
...
Twisted state boltzmann
  12/08/22
...
Costumed 180 Base
  12/08/22
Woodchipper inshallah
zombie-like pale stage
  12/07/22
🤯🔫
Brass box office legend
  12/07/22
...
stirring dingle berry
  12/07/22
Thought this said “Kissless Seniors” and assumed...
Vibrant filthy doctorate
  12/08/22
Thanks, libs!
Spruce at-the-ready locale
  12/08/22
...
stirring dingle berry
  12/08/22


Poast new message in this thread



Reply Favorite

Date: December 6th, 2022 10:37 PM
Author: stirring dingle berry

Who Will Care for ‘Kinless’ Seniors? https://nyti.ms/3XRrFW6

THE NEW OLD AGE

Who Will Care for ‘Kinless’ Seniors?

Nearly one million Americans have no immediate family members to provide assistance if needed. The number is expected to grow.

By Paula Span

Published Dec. 3, 2022

Updated Dec. 5, 2022

Lynne Ingersoll and her cat, Jesse, spent a quiet Thanksgiving Day together in her small bungalow in Blue Island, Ill.

A retired librarian, Ms. Ingersoll never married or had children. At 77, she has outlived her parents, three partners, her two closest friends, five dogs and eight cats.

When her sister died three years ago, Ms. Ingersoll joined the ranks of older Americans considered “kinless”: without partners or spouses, children or siblings. Covid-19 has largely suspended her occasional get-togethers with friends, too. Now, she said, “my social life consists of doctors and store clerks — that’s a joke, but it’s pretty much true.”

Like many older adults, Ms. Ingersoll copes with an array of health problems: kidney disease, asthma, heart disease requiring a pacemaker, arthritis that makes walking difficult even with a cane. She’s managing, but “I can see a time when that’s not going to be true,” she said. “I’m not sure what I’m going to do about it.”

An estimated 6.6 percent of American adults aged 55 and older have no living spouse or biological children, according to a study published in 2017 in The Journals of Gerontology: Series B. (Researchers often use this definition of kinlessness because spouses and children are the relatives most apt to serve as family caregivers.)

About 1 percent fit a narrower definition — lacking a spouse or partner, children and biological siblings. The figure rises to 3 percent among women over 75.

Those aren’t high proportions, but they amount to a lot of kinless people: close to a million older Americans without a spouse or partner, children or siblings in 2019, including about 370,000 women over 75.

“We assume that everyone has at least some family, but that’s not the case anymore,” said Rachel Margolis, a sociologist at the University of Western Ontario and co-author of the study.

Several demographic factors have fostered increased kinlessness. Baby boomers have lower marriage rates and higher divorce rates than their parents, and more have remained childless. The rise of so-called gray divorce, after age 50, also means fewer married seniors, and extended life spans can make for more years without surviving family.

All the pathways to singlehood have grown,” said Dr. Deborah Carr, a sociologist and researcher at Boston University.

Among older couples, cohabitation has increased as an alternative to marriage, but those seniors are less likely than married couples to receive care from their partners. Those in committed relationships who don’t live with their partners are less likely still.

In addition, seniors who are Black, female and have lower levels of wealth have particularly high rates of kinlessness.

The growing number of kinless seniors, who sometimes call themselves “elder orphans” or “solo agers,” worries researchers and advocates, because this group faces numerous disadvantages.

A study of middle-aged and older adults in Canada found that those without partners or children (this study included no data on siblings) had lower levels of self-reported mental and physical health and higher levels of loneliness. They were less likely to participate in activities like sports, cultural or religious groups, or service clubs — a predictor of later cognitive impairment.

Kinless Americans die earlier. Dr. Margolis and her co-authors, using data from the Health and Retirement Study, found that a decade after respondents’ initial interviews, more than 80 percent of seniors with partners and children had survived, compared with only about 60 percent of those without either.

At the end of life, researchers at Mount Sinai in New York reported, people without partners and children had received fewer hours of caregiving each week and were more likely to have died in nursing homes.

“Getting old is hard under the best of circumstances, and even harder if you’re going it alone or with weak social ties,” Dr. Carr said.

How Has the Rising Cost of Long-Term Health Care Affected You?

On the other hand, meet Joan DelFattore, 76, a retired English professor at the University of Delaware. Like some solo agers, “I had a sense from an early age that I simply didn’t see myself as a wife and mother,” she said.

Preferring to live alone, “I went about constructing a single life,” she said.

Dr. DelFattore, who is in good health, still writes and researches, and she teaches a graduate course every other fall. She stays in near-daily contact with a group of friends, walking several times a week with one of them, and remains close to cousins in New Jersey, with whom she spent Thanksgiving. She takes an active role in several local organizations.

And she dislikes “the cultural perception that old people being without immediate family has to mean that you’re needy, you don’t have support.”

Sociologists call that strategy “substitution” — turning to friends and neighbors for the connections and sustenance that families traditionally have provided.

In Mount Lebanon, Pa., for instance, Celeste Seeman, who is divorced and childless and has lived alone for 25 years, has befriended neighbors in her apartment building. When one had surgery recently, Ms. Seeman, 65 and still working as an embroidery machine operator, walked the neighbor’s Chihuahuas, did her laundry and called her almost daily for weeks.

“I hope that what goes around comes around,” Ms. Seeman said. Because she has outlived her family, after caring for her parents until their deaths, there’s no remaining relative to provide similar help if she needs it herself.

“I’m frightened about it,” she acknowledged, then added, “You can’t dwell on stuff. It might not happen.”

A study of sole family survivors, the last members of the families they grew up in, found that, for unclear reasons, they were also disproportionately likely to lack spouses or partners and children, and thus were doubly vulnerable.

Of course, having family is no guarantee of help as people age. Estrangement, geographic distance and relatives’ own declining health can render them unwilling or unable to serve as caregivers.

Still, “our system of caring for the aged has functioned, for better or worse, on the backs of spouses and, secondarily, adult children,” said Susan Brown, a sociologist at Bowling Green State University and an author of the study of sole family survivors.

Relying on substitutes has limitations. About two-thirds of older Americans will eventually hit a rubber-meets-the-road moment and require help with the activities of daily living, such as bathing, dressing and using the toilet.

“Friends and neighbors may help with meals or pick up a prescription, but they’re not going to help you in the shower,” Dr. Margolis said.

Dr. DelFattore has prepared for that possibility by buying insurance for long-term care years ago, so that she can hire home care aides or afford assisted living. Few Americans have done that or can afford the costs, yet most will also be unable to pay for sufficient care out-of-pocket and don’t have incomes low enough to qualify for Medicaid.

“Policies tend to lag behind reality,” Dr. Carr said. “There was the belief in past decades that older adults would be married and have children; that’s what the classic American family looked like. It no longer does.”

In the absence of any broad public program, experts suggest a variety of smaller solutions to support kinless seniors.

Shared housing and co-housing, providing safety and assistance in numbers and community, could grow, especially with public and philanthropic support. The village movement, which helps seniors age in place, might similarly expand.

Revised family-leave policies and caregiver-support programs could include friends and neighbors, or more distant relatives like nieces and nephews.

However governments, community organizations and health care systems begin to address the issue, there’s little time to waste. Projections indicate that kinlessness will increase greatly as the population cohorts behind the baby boom age.

“Younger people are less likely to marry and have children, and they have fewer siblings” as family sizes shrink, Dr. Brown said. “How will they navigate health declines? We don’t have a good answer. I’m not sure people are paying attention.”

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45596895)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 6th, 2022 10:39 PM
Author: stirring dingle berry

I'm 70 years old, in multi-faceted poor health, and living tightly check-to-check on Social Security. I'm also 100% kinless in terms of family. All of my many friends have either relocated or died. Like many New Yorkers, I've "kept myself to myself" in the same apartment building for many years. I spend 98% of my time alone at home. So far, I still have most of my marbles and albeit with difficulty can take care of myself. And I am absolutely haunted and terrified about what will become of me if that changes. I find it a constant irritation that politicians and "influencers" constantly talk about The American Family. Not everyone has family. But if not family, certainly friends and neighbors. No. I know 3 local people I'd call friends. We live in different boroughs. I rarely see them and none would be willing or able to provide long-term care. I was pleased to see this article. I hope this and further coverage results in resources for the millions like me. But I want to add there's lots of chatter about mental health these days - and in that context, talk of suicide. Not all suicide is a result of mental illness or grief or even unhappiness. Sometimes it's a sober, rational, life choice based on existing circumstances - just like abortion. I'm not planning on it, but I don't rule it out.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45596901)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 7th, 2022 9:00 AM
Author: Vivacious sooty business firm clown

wow this is sad

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45597985)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 7th, 2022 10:00 AM
Author: Contagious Old Irish Cottage

:(

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45598189)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 7th, 2022 10:34 AM
Author: stirring dingle berry



(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45598416)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 7th, 2022 10:30 PM
Author: arousing kitty

"I find it a constant irritation that politicians and "influencers" constantly talk about The American Family. Not everyone has family."

One wonders if someone like this has even the slightest grasp how the world around her functions

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45601788)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 7th, 2022 10:32 PM
Author: zombie-like pale stage

Gas all

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45601793)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 7th, 2022 11:04 PM
Author: Doobsian blathering plaza

New Yorker constantly terrified of death and irritated by any mention of the word "family"...

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45601884)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 8th, 2022 10:47 AM
Author: stirring dingle berry



(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45603313)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 8th, 2022 8:12 AM
Author: Mischievous Space Idea He Suggested

no, obviously. and that people like this are allowed to exercise even infinitesimal power over anyone else through voting on federal government representation is one of the most short-sighted, if not outright malicious, policies in this shithold country and a naked injustice.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45602794)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 8th, 2022 3:06 PM
Author: arousing kitty



(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45604728)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 7th, 2022 10:32 PM
Author: Brass box office legend

"Sometimes it's a sober, rational, life choice based on existing circumstances - just like abortion. I'm not planning on it..."

Agreed, but I am.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45601794)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 6th, 2022 10:40 PM
Author: stirring dingle berry

Now let's see the studies of "elderly" (who made up that nonsensical noun?) who are alone by choice. Ask us whether we prefer not having to put up with relatives we don't like, or the simple-minded nattering of paid caregivers, rather than going gentle into that good night. I'm 85. Shoveling my own snow, mowing my lawn with my muscle-powered mower, lugging my trash to the dump (switching arms to throw bags to balance muscle building.) At some point, I'll no longer be able to do these things. So, I'll commit suicide. I don't care what happens to my house or my 3000+ books or anything other than my cats. Let me buy some pills that will kill me quietly and gently. What's the problem with that?

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45596907)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 7th, 2022 6:29 AM
Author: Doobsian blathering plaza

Wow

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45597794)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 7th, 2022 6:31 AM
Author: stirring dingle berry

Wow indeed! I didn't know we had poasters in their 80s!

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45597797)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 7th, 2022 10:09 AM
Author: Lascivious Twinkling Background Story



(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45598244)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 7th, 2022 10:35 AM
Author: stirring dingle berry



(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45598418)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 7th, 2022 10:14 PM
Author: High-end Location Patrolman



(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45601736)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 8th, 2022 8:14 AM
Author: Mischievous Space Idea He Suggested



(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45602797)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 6th, 2022 10:41 PM
Author: stirring dingle berry

I am in the same boat, though the water hasn't risen yet. Approaching 80, with various health issues, still able to care for myself, but knowing that will eventually change, unless I get hit by a truck, or some equivalent sudden fatality. No kids, spouse long divorced, sibs far from NY. and also old. May I raise a largely taboo subject? Personally, I'd like to live as long as I am physically, cognitively, emotionally able to care for myself, not in chronic pain, and able to handle financial and other affairs (keep appointments, pay bills, taxes, etc.) Then I would like to say goodbye, before life gets to what is for me- and each person judges for themselves- not worth living. (Disclosure- my mother died after years of Alzheimer's, until she was totally out of it). At that point I'd love to be able to choose a peaceful- not violent- death. But that is not allowed, even in other countries that allow euthanasia unless your life is terminal in short order. I am pro-choice: both re abortion and death. I believe that choosing to end one's life can be a rational choice and should be allowed. I am not afraid of dying. I am afraid of being helpless, staring at the ceiling, in chronic pain, unable to enjoy life, etc. Shouldn't I have a choice?

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45596915)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 6th, 2022 11:30 PM
Author: stirring dingle berry



(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45597126)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 7th, 2022 9:56 AM
Author: abusive trailer park

Bit of an admission here re abortion

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45598172)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 7th, 2022 6:22 AM
Author: stirring dingle berry



(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45597779)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 7th, 2022 7:19 AM
Author: stirring dingle berry



(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45597860)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 7th, 2022 9:34 AM
Author: Cream glittery senate tattoo



(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45598080)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 7th, 2022 10:00 AM
Author: Lascivious Twinkling Background Story

There was an article a couple of years back -- in the New Yorker or something like that-- about these older people who live alone in the city. Eventually the people who care about them die, their contacts drift away and they are forgotten. Guy dies in his apartment and nobody knows about it until weeks go by and people smell something. Terribly sad and depressing. Happens more than you would think and is going to be happening a LOT more in the coming years.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45598185)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 7th, 2022 10:16 PM
Author: High-end Location Patrolman

It's a darling minidoc topic for Westerners to cover body cleanup crews in Japan. Now the shoe's on the other cadaver.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45601740)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 7th, 2022 10:03 AM
Author: mind-boggling wild pit trust fund

This will dominate XO posts within 20 yrs

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45598211)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 7th, 2022 10:33 AM
Author: stirring dingle berry



(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45598412)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 7th, 2022 10:34 AM
Author: Chrome hospital

Grandparentmos STYLING on the nokidmos

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45598417)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 7th, 2022 10:37 AM
Author: Grizzly Alpha

“Any bros in their 70s successfully started over in a new city?”

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45598430)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 7th, 2022 10:09 PM
Author: Doobsian blathering plaza

"Possible to make new friends as a 78 year old widower?"

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45601721)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 8th, 2022 10:47 AM
Author: stirring dingle berry



(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45603309)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 8th, 2022 12:13 AM
Author: Chrome hospital



(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45602081)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 8th, 2022 5:22 AM
Author: stirring dingle berry



(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45602537)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 8th, 2022 8:15 AM
Author: Mischievous Space Idea He Suggested



(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45602800)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 8th, 2022 7:07 PM
Author: Costumed 180 Base



(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45605909)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 7th, 2022 10:34 AM
Author: Heady Poppy Dopamine Parlor

Make them food

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45598415)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 7th, 2022 10:17 PM
Author: High-end Location Patrolman

Like, Meals on Wheels?

Or Soylent Green?

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45601743)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 7th, 2022 10:24 PM
Author: big-titted spectacular queen of the night lodge

ZOG destroyed the western family, the community, the nation, insisting that you live as an atomized globohomo integer surrounded by hostile 3rd-world foreigners -- while they loot your birthright to fight endless tribal grudge wars on behalf of their ethnonationalist 'homeland'.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45601764)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 7th, 2022 10:36 PM
Author: stimulating crackhouse ladyboy

Pretty dope, imo

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45601811)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 7th, 2022 10:44 PM
Author: Jet market personal credit line



(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45601833)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 8th, 2022 8:15 AM
Author: Mischievous Space Idea He Suggested



(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45602802)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 8th, 2022 12:30 PM
Author: Twisted state boltzmann



(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45603890)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 8th, 2022 7:07 PM
Author: Costumed 180 Base



(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45605910)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 7th, 2022 10:25 PM
Author: zombie-like pale stage

Woodchipper inshallah

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45601768)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 7th, 2022 10:31 PM
Author: Brass box office legend

🤯🔫

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45601790)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 7th, 2022 11:16 PM
Author: stirring dingle berry



(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45601911)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 8th, 2022 5:42 AM
Author: Vibrant filthy doctorate

Thought this said “Kissless Seniors” and assumed it was about HS incels

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45602562)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 8th, 2022 8:16 AM
Author: Spruce at-the-ready locale

Thanks, libs!

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45602804)



Reply Favorite

Date: December 8th, 2022 7:05 PM
Author: stirring dingle berry



(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5248688&forum_id=2#45605905)