Is This The Secret To Keeping Our Parents Young?
“Make sure... that you're enriching their lives like a parent would enrich a kindergartner’s life.”
Our culture doesn’t exactly make aging “fun.” Getting older is stigmatized, and if you can’t stop it with diets, face lifts, or chemical peels, well, you might as well just accept it. Got a few wrinkles? Well, you’re old now. Act like it!
It can be difficult to watch the older people in your life decide that their time for fun is over. That’s why Liv Schreiber says that it should be on us, the children and grandchildren, to keep the good times rolling.
“The worst thing ever that no one talks about is when your parents and your grandparents decide to get old,” she said in a TikTok. “Whether it’s at 105 or 65, they've decided they're old, and there's no changing their minds.”
Schreiber says that it’s the younger generation’s responsibility to ensure that the older folks don’t fall into monotony. In fact, it can be a full-circle moment.
“It's our jobs to keep them young and curious and enchanted with their lives and with ours,” she said. “Make sure that they're laughing and dancing and exploring and curious and that you're enriching their lives like a parent would enrich a kindergartner’s life, and that's how you'll keep them young.”
And look, “keeping them young” doesn’t mean you have to have a mother-daughter night at the club (unless you wanted to). It could mean planning a trip to the beach or a baseball game, letting them take the kids for a weekend, or even just catching a post-8 p.m. movie screening. It’s about varying from routine, and making new memories.
Some users shared that they’ve taken up this responsibility themselves.
“This !!!! I keep trying to pour life into her,” one user commented.
“I had an older friend do this at like 50 but she totally turned it around and I’m so happy for her,” said another.
However, a few users said that they didn’t think the role should fall onto their shoulders.
“I respect where your heart is on this but I’m done doing the emotional labor of the people who are supposed to enrich me,” one user explained. “It is absolutely not my job, especially when they refuse all help.”
Not everyone has a positive relationship with their parents — and I don’t think this is directed at those who would rather not spend time with theirs. But, for the parents who did pour their time, energy and love into you, this is an opportunity to return the favor.
