Midlife Siblings can reconnect with each other and help their aging parent by joining what Gail Sheehy, in her new book Passages in Caregiving calls a Circle of Care.
A circle of care would include emotional resources for the direct family caregiver, like adult siblings. Reconnecting midlife brother's and sisters , through the circle of care, is an important task that a therapist can encourage an aging sibling to take on, as siblings are the longest and deepest relationship in any person's life.
The therapist may have to depend on his clinical skills in helping siblings with forgiveness or reconnecting siblings who live long distance to add them to a circle of care.
Midlife siblings have often spent the last 30 years tending to their own families so the point of reconnection of midlife brothers and sisters often happens when they are in middle age in the midst of a crisis in parent care.
When they enter the baby boomer stage- many middle aged brothers and sisters face a sibling crisis.
This is where the therapist either needs to have clinical skills in midlife sibling work or find the resources for the family ,who can help with this healing sibling reconncetion. The therapist should use their coaching skills to help the main caregiver ask adult brothers and sisters for help . Often the communication between brothers and sisters involving parent care, is very poor and weak.
Sisters especially need help in asking assistance from brothers and all need help in asking for assistance from estranged siblings. After the help is requested coaching siblings to say thank you, I love you and then set up the new caregiving system , which is an expanded circle of care, is a primary therapists job.
