'A superbly written and surprising memoir about hope, redemption, self-worth, and the tangled and often contradictory impulses of love.
'Cynthia Dearborn is struggling to convince her father, who has vascular dementia, to move into an aged care facility. He won’t budge. Further complicating matters is the fact that Cynthia lives in Sydney, and her father in Seattle. Truth be told, it suits her to live halfway around the world from her family.
'Cynthia’s attempts to get her father and stepmother into care, and to protect them from themselves and each other, drive this compelling memoir. But braided in is a deeply moving and surprising backstory about Cynthia’s tumultuous childhood and the difficult relationships she had with both parents.
'The Year My Family Unravelled continues to surprise right to the last page. Despite heavy subject matter — mental decline, illness, abuse, death — this is a memoir of buoyancy and hope. Ultimately, it is a story about redemption, self-worth, and the tangled and often contradictory impulses of love.' (Publication summary)
How do you go about looking after an ailing aged parent when you are halfway across the world from each other?
'Dementia has been in the spotlight in recent times, largely because an ageing population has made the disease unignorable. Indeed, we have seen the labelling of a new generation – the “sandwich generation” – to recognise a cohort of middle-aged people caught between caring for their growing children and their ageing parents. Cynthia Dearborn’s The Year My Family Unravelled is a personal account of the challenges of caregiving for the elderly, though in Dearborn’s case she finds herself sandwiched between two countries, Australia and the United States, and two phases of her life, the functional one of her present and the dysfunctional one of her childhood.' (Introduction)
'Dementia has been in the spotlight in recent times, largely because an ageing population has made the disease unignorable. Indeed, we have seen the labelling of a new generation – the “sandwich generation” – to recognise a cohort of middle-aged people caught between caring for their growing children and their ageing parents. Cynthia Dearborn’s The Year My Family Unravelled is a personal account of the challenges of caregiving for the elderly, though in Dearborn’s case she finds herself sandwiched between two countries, Australia and the United States, and two phases of her life, the functional one of her present and the dysfunctional one of her childhood.' (Introduction)
How do you go about looking after an ailing aged parent when you are halfway across the world from each other?
