UK Helpline: 0345 123 2304 | tcf.org.uk As their surviving child/ren, we may also need to guard against becoming overprotective of our parents. For instance, we may hesitate to let them know about difficult life events such as a job loss or relationship breakdown to prevent causing them further worry, but this may have the undesired consequence of creating a distance between us. We will also need to keep evaluating how much help we can and should offer our parents. This is particularly the case if our parent is living alone. Our help may be needed and appreciated, but we may also need to be careful not to intrude too much on their lives or decision-making. This type of role reversal does seem to happen sometimes, especially with elderly parents. Generational and other differences “My mother gets a lot of solace from her faith, but to keep hearing her say that our sister is ‘safe and happy at home in heaven’ makes me feel that I can’t be real with her about the depth of my grief. It’s like she’s dismissing the pain.” When a child has died through suicide or following controversial lifestyle choices, such as drug or alcohol use, some parents will avoid revealing the facts of what happened. They may not want the circumstances to be discussed openly such as within the wider family or amongst friends, and certainly not on places like social media. As siblings, we may tend more towards openness than our parents. We may feel it is pointless and unhelpful to hide the reality of what has happened. This can be a cause of disagreement within the family. Other differences may arise from our varying memories and experiences of our sibling. Each member of the family will have had a unique relationship with them – for example, we might know things about our sibling’s life and activities that our parents remain unaware of. Whilst the sharing of memories can be comforting, differing memories or interpretations of past events can cause tension and distress. Sometimes after a person dies, they are spoken about as though they never had any faults or made any mistakes. If family members place our sibling on such a pedestal, we may feel pressure to live up to extremely high – and unrealistic – standards. When things then go wrong in our own lives, such as losing a job, a relationship break-up, or poor decisions, we may find it hard to deal with. We may fear that we are causing our parents too much extra pain. It could take some time before the pressure of expectations diminishes.
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