how much does your love and caring caring cost? Doing right can be expensive- This useful article makes this point -Qj

The Costs For Family Caregivers Continues to Rise
Doing the right thing is an expensive proposition
By Mike Magee, MD

In the United States nearly a quarter of our multi-generational families have a family member working in a job that they never trained for, never asked for, and have never been paid for. That job is the informal family caregiver.1 It is estimated that there are 34 million Americans providing care for older family members and friends.2 They are drawn in primarily by a sense of responsibility and pressing need. For activities of daily living, which we often take for granted, like feeding, bathing, and toileting, success requires mobility, strength, balance and normal mental capacities. But the truth is that as we age, many of us lose the ability to care for ourselves. And as we do, family members step in to fill the gap. But they do so at great cost to themselves.How much cost? Well, if we are just looking at the dollars, on average, in a recent study of 1,000 informal family caregivers, the annual cost was $5,500 dollars. And if you were caring for a family member from afar, let’s say from another state or distant community, the average cost was $8,728 dollars per year. Where did the money go? It splits up almost evenly into four pieces: direct medical expenses; household items, including food; extra help and travel; and home repairs and basic day-to-day equipment. More specifically, 42 percent of respondents in this study had paid for household goods or food in the past year; 39 percent had funded transportation; 31 percent had covered the co-payment costs of an elder’s drugs or medical payments; 21 percent had purchased clothing and 13 percent had paid for home improvements.3Where does the money come from? Half of the family caregivers cut back on hobbies, leisure activities and vacations. One third dipped into savings and deferred major purchases for themselves. And a quarter cut back on their own groceries and seeing their doctors to cover the costs. Not surprising then, informal family caregivers, isolated in this complex world, overwhelmed and lacking system support and financial aid, often become sick themselves as they struggle to do the right thing.3