I didn’t volunteer to become a caregiver to my elderly parents. Instead, I was slowly initiated into the role. It started by doing little things to help. Even though they were in their mid-eighties, they insisted on staying in Pensacola, Fla., their home of 50 years. Since I lived in Virginia, I called twice a week to check on them and shopped for them online. With each visit, I tried to notice things that would tell me if they were doing all right.

One of the defining moments of Karen Bond’s professional career came about five years ago. “For years, I had worked really hard to become president of Executive Alliance,” she said of the nonprofit dedicated to helping professional women succeed in leadership roles.
 
At the time, Bond was taking care of her mother who had dementia along with being a mother to her daughter and having a thriving professional career. “The day of our Women of Excellence luncheon, that I had always dreamed that my mother would be able to be there and see that achievement, was the day that my caregiver didn’t show up and I was scheduled to be in front of a thousand women. I barely got there in time.”
 
Caregiving can be extremely challenging for professional women as many must juggle their careers with motherhood and with their elderly parents/relatives. While home health care aides can help, a majority of women take on the caregiving responsibility themselves.
 
 From: The Daily Record (Maryland)