Abstract
A four-generation family imposes a burden of roles upon the grandparents, who are sandwiched between the ascendant generation of great-grandparents and the descendant generations of adult children and grandchildren. This study focused on working grandmothers, examines how they maneuver between the needs of their children, grandchildren and their task-load, the women did not perceive their situation negatively. Rather, they maneuver between the various roles and express a general contentment with their lives. The findings show that these women see their work as a private domain that provides protection from the duties related to caregiving. Applying the extended concept of “double sandwich”, the study describes the complex position of working women in four-tiered intergenerational structure.
Introduction
Recent increases in life expectancy have created a demographic phenomenon of four-generation families. Co-residence is not a necessary component in these families. It is therefore no longer unusual nowadays for people in their sixties who are still part of the workforce, to have not only grandchildren and children of their own, but elderly living parents as well. The need to care for aging parents while also helping adult children by taking care of grandchildren, imposes a considerable task burden on the grandparent generation, and to an unequal extent on grandmothers. Moreover, due to increased longevity, it is expected that the timeframe in which grandparents will be forced to care for their elderly parents might be even longer than that devoted to childrearing.
In the aging society that we now inhabit, the family fulfils many roles related to caring for and tending to the welfare of family members. Even in countries that boast a robust public welfare system and institutions that support the care of both young children and the elderly population, family support remains an indispensable factor, especially the support provided by the middle generation (Gattai & Musatti, 1999; Hank & Buber, 2009; Lundholm & Malmberg, 2009).
The “Sandwich Generation” is a designation introduced by the research literature on this topic to characterize the generation burdened with helping both the older ascendant generation and the younger descendant one (Durity, 1991; Miller, 1981). This literature focuses especially on the dilemma of the middle generation, and in particular on women who are required to support the older and younger generations while sometimes also participating in the labor market (Grundy & Henretta, 2006; Lundholm & Malmberg, 2009). This dimension is reflected in this group’s characterization sometimes as “the Working Sandwich Generation” (Hammer & Neal, 2008). A review of the literature reveals that most studies of the topic have looked at the sandwich generation within three-generation families, with a focus on middle-aged women positioned between aging parents and adult children who were not yet fully independent (Grundy & Henretta, 2006). Only a few studies (e.g. Meyer, 2014) examined four-generation families comprising a working grandmother who assists her adult children while also caring for grandchildren and elders. As a result, women in their sixties have remained outside the scope of research as reflected both in feminist research literature and in studies of the family.
The purpose of the current study is to examine how working women in their sixties maneuver between the needs of children, grandchildren, and those of elderly parents. The way in which they provide emotional and economic support to three different generation, articulate their perceptions about this life stage, and construct a narrative that facilitates the integration of these three worlds of work, family, and old age. This study places the experiences of this group at the center of its discussion mainly because of their invisibility and absence from both public discourse and research agendas.
Literature Review
The Commitment Dilemma between the Grandmother Role and Working
The conflicts experienced by mothers who combine domestic work and childcare with paid work outside the home have been widely discussed in feminist research and in studies of the family. Now, as the rates of older women’s participation in the workforce are on the rise, these issues have become pertinent to older women as well. Moreover, the high rates of young working mothers who rely on their parents, and especially on their mothers, for child care mean that contemporary grandmothers still in formal employment outside the home are likely to combine work with the duties of caring for their own grandchildren (Meyer, 2014). In the past decade, as researchers have realized that many grandmothers are still employed in the workforce, attention has turned to the question of how grandparents, and not just working mothers, manage the combined load of work responsibilities and commitments to caring for grandchildren (Hochman & Lewin-Epstein, 2013; Lakomy & Kreidl, 2015; Meyer, 2014; Wilinska et al, 2019). These studies have yielded inconsistent conclusions regarding the correlations between a grandmother’s salaried employment and her role as a caregiver. Still, there appears to be a consensus that notwithstanding the enjoyment derived from their childcaring roles, the increased task load and the need to juggle between tasks women exact a heavy price from women in terms of stress and emotional overload, with adverse effects on their health, recreational patterns, and lifestyle in general.
Some have argued that the burden of caring for family members affects work functioning. Several researchers found, for example, that workers falling under the definition of the “sandwich generation” who take care of various family members are subject to multiple pressures and tend to greater absenteeism at work, compared with those falling outside this definition who take care only of their children or parents (Fredriksen-Goldsen & Scharlach, 2001). Other studies claim that grandmothers sometimes either give up working altogether, take early retirement or scale back to part-time in order to devote themselves to caring for their family’s needs, and that these options are the only one allowing them to combine salaried work with the care of their grandchildren (Hochman & Lewin-Epstein, 2013; Lakomy & Kreidl, 2015; Pruchno & McKenney, 2009). Nonetheless, quitting a job or even reducing it to a part time position carries significant economic repercussions, since the last years prior to retirement are in fact highly instrumental for accumulating a larger pension. Forfeiting working hours in order to care for family members is tantamount to inflicting financial damage on oneself (Pruchno & McKenney, 2009). Women are also sometimes obliged to take unpaid absences from work in order to look after grandchildren. The harm is not only financial but their leisure time and social lives also suffer due to these sacrifices. Wilinska and colleagues found that grandmothers have lower chances for being employed compared to women without grandchildren (Wilinska et al, 2019). Other studies, however, did not associate negative outcomes with the combining of work and caring for grandchildren (e.g., Silverstein & Marenco, 2001).)
Ambiguity of role definitions and fluidity in respect to family relationships are characteristic features of contemporary society, and the lack of a single unambiguous definition for the role of the grandmother is no exception. Due to the lack of a clear role-definition for older parenting, there are no shared norms regulating the relations of grandparents with their elderly parents, or with the descendant generation of children who are parents themselves. Even the grandparenting role per se is no longer governed by common norms. Where in a former day and age it was understood that the grandmother’s job was to look after the grandchildren, the current meanings of grandparenthood are complex and fuzzy, assuming an active and involved grandparenting role is no longer axiomatic but rather a matter of personal choice (Gattai & Musatti, 1999). Furthermore, society imposes a double standard on grandmothers and conveys mixed messages regarding expectations. Grandmothers are expected to have a dynamic relationship with their grandchildren, show involvement, and support them emotionally and sometimes financially, and at the same time they are expected to stand beside their aging parents and help them. On the other hand, society also expects them to continue to work as long as they are can and avoid the onset of retirement (Scraton & Holland, 2006).
In summary, studies of grandparenthood recognize a variety of grandparenting patterns, but all operate under the veiled assumption that it is the grandparents’ job to help their adult children raise their grandchildren. In the Israeli context, the grandmother role presents an interesting case because of the tensions related to a certain duality of Israeli society, which remains deeply familial in its orientation, while life is organized around modern social practices and work arrangements. These entrenched familial commitments apply to everyone in the category of family and also in respect to the grandmother’s role. On the one hand, grandmothers may legitimately continue to work and embody a modernized version of their grandmother role, which does not necessarily entail caring for grandchildren, but on the other hand they are still expected to lend themselves to childrearing tasks, in accordance with the intergenerational relationship and the intergenerational contract, as we shall discuss presently.
Continuous Intergenerational Contract
In wake of the mass-scale incorporation of married women and mothers into the workforce, feminist research has placed the work world at the center of its agenda, with a focus on young women who shoulder a double burden of family and work. The focus on women of working age, as Krekula (2007) argues, has sidelined older women as topics of research, based on an assumption that household and caregiving responsibilities lessen over time, after children grow up and leave the nest. However, as several studies have shown, familial attitudes and intergenerational relations do not diminish with time, but may even intensify, and familial roles are not temporary but rather ongoing. One finds therefore that the active parenting role persists even when a person’s children have themselves become parents (Berkovitz & Manor, 2018; Hagestad, 2006). In Israel, the familial ethos places an expectation on parents to continue to look after their children and grandchildren and to help them both financially and by sharing in childrearing tasks (Spilerman & Elmelech, 2001). The task load does not diminish, and the phase of active parenting remains open-ended as children mature, marry, have families of their own, and add grandchildren to the family circle. As a result, many women are thrust into the grandparenting role with the aim of helping their children establish themselves in the workforce and develop independent careers (Izraeli, 1992). A study that looked at relations between older parents and their adult children in five different countries found that children in Israel receive more emotional support from their parents than is the norm in other countries; they see one another more frequently and tend to live in relative proximity to each other (Lowenstein and Ogg 2003).
Intergenerational relations within families rely on an intergenerational contract that regulates the mutual relations within the family, and the duties and rights of each family member. The intergenerational contract is rooted in social norms and prescriptions that encourage parents to support their young children, and adult children to look after the welfare of their aging parents. Intergenerational relations are characterized by mutual assistance and support (Lowenstein & Katz, 2000). Thus, as parents age, adult children are expected to help them, while they themselves are expected to enlist in caring for grandchildren.
Bengtson and Roberts portray these relationships through a model of intergenerational solidarity (Bengtson & Roberts, 1991). This model takes into account the relations of give and take within the family, the degree of intergenerational closeness in both emotional and geographical terms, and the relationship patterns, as well as patterns of help and support. The model of intergenerational solidarity serves as a conceptual framework for understanding family relationships during old age and it conceptualizes intergenerational solidarity as a multi-dimensional phenomenon that expresses behavioral, emotional, cognitive, and structural aspects of family ties (Bengston & Roberts, 1991). Nevertheless, one cannot overlook other aspects that may affect intergenerational relations, such as tension, conflicts, exclusion and loneliness, exploitation and lack of solidarity, etc. Consequently, intergenerational relations within a family may be described in terms of love-hate relations, or solidarity and integration versus lack of solidarity and dis-integration. Silverstein and colleagues (Silverstein, et.al. 2010) argue that the intergenerational relations between older parents and their adult children are marked by ambivalence, in other words by the coexistence of positive and negative feelings. Family members thus have contradictory feelings of affection and anger toward one another. Ambivalence within intergenerational relations shapes the relationship between grandparents and grandchildren and between parents and their children, and dictates modes of behavior (Bengstone, 2001). In keeping with the intergenerational contract and in accordance with social expectations, daughters take care of their elderly parents, and young mothers go out to work, relying on their mothers to help them look after the children, even when their mother (the grandmother) is still an employee herself. Bengstone (2001) points out that the present demographic constellation creates a situation in which the intergenerational contract and intergenerational relationships are sustained and hold sway for many years, far longer than in the past.
Theoretical Framework
In the 1970s and 1980s, much research on the family was premised on the theory of role strain. This theory posits that there are limits to a person’s time and energy resources, and that the various requirements of caring for parents and/or children, domestic chores, and responsibilities outside the home—which cumulatively create a huge task burden on the individual—are in competition for these resources (Katz, 1988). Researchers found that the sundry demands on the individual and the multiplicity of tasks involved in caregiving generate role conflict and high levels of stress (Grundy& Henretta, 2006; Hammer & Neal, 2008). Moreover, the task burden involved in caring for family members affects a person’s functioning and efficiency at work (Hammer & Neal, 2008; Pagani & Marenzi, 2008). As mentioned, despite changes in the gendered division of labor, care of children and elderly parents is still considered a female task. However, unlike in the past, when fewer women worked outside the home, today it is common for women to maintain employment while taking care of family and children, and thus caring for elderly parents represents an added burden on the shoulders of middle-aged women (Grundy & Henretta, 2006; Singleton, 2000).
In contrast to role theory’s focus on the variability of tasks assigned to different family members, other theories emphasized the stages in a family’s life. For example, Duvall’s classic theory (Duvall, 1962), constructed an eight-stage model of family life cycle, each stage reflecting an addition to the family composition following the births of children and the subsequent changes in the family members’ roles. Duvall’s model suffers from several shortcomings, among which are its lack of consideration of meaningful life roles such as grandparenting or caring for elderly parents. More recent theories have since emerged, including Baltes’ lifespan perspective (Baltes, 1987) and Georgy’s life course theory (George, 1993). Without dwelling on their differences, these theories emphasize the paths travelled and passages navigated by families throughout a lifetime, and the short- and long-term implications of these experiences. Importantly, the overall chronology of such passages has changed in recent years. For example, the average age at which a person experiences the death of a parent is significantly higher; the grandparenting phase starts later, and thus also the loss of a spouse usually occurs later in life and is experienced more frequently by women.
As Lachman has argued (Lachman, 2004), the theories of role strain and life course theory are helpful for understanding the life-stage termed “middle age”, since middle-aged people (ages 55–65 years) inhabit multiple family and social roles, experience role-conflict, and are sometimes required to prioritize their time and resources. Furthermore, their parenting role does not terminate, even if their adult children are no longer living at home. Rather, this role changes, bringing with it a set of new tasks, such as the care of grandchildren or elderly parents.
Caring for a Parent in the Four-generational Family
Taking care of needy parents is one of the most difficult and complex roles that life presents. Given the long lifespans of today’s elderly population, women in their fifties and sixties are assuming caregiving roles toward their elderly parents for extended time periods, and such roles are more prevalent today than in the past. As KuliK has argued (2012), in accordance with traditional gender expectations, grandmothers shoulder the heavier burden in caring for the older generation, much more so than grandfathers; this generalization applies also to the care extended to parents-in-law. The care provided by grandmothers is often critical for the continued day-to-day functioning of the elderly parents (Lundholm & Malmberg, 2009). While agreeing that women generally take on the greater part of the burden, some researchers claim that men do show involvement and assist to some extent parent care, although they expend fewer hours than women do on these activities (Hammer & Neal, 2008). Men tend to focus on the more practical aspects of caring such as chauffeuring, shopping, and helping with administrative tasks, while women spend more time with their parents and provide more support and emotional involvement (Halperin, 2019).
The phenomenon of grandmothers “sandwiched” (Zal. 1992) between elderly parents and adult children and grandchildren is sometimes also referred to as “generational squeeze” (Levitt, et. Al., 1992). In the past, “the sandwich generation” was squeezed by the two surrounding generations of children and parents. However, today’s sandwich generation, which is chronologically older, is embedded within a four-generation family structure, by three generations: elderly parents, adult children, and grandchildren. Whereas in the past, the sandwich generation experienced this situation as a relatively short phase, nowadays this phase is quite prolonged, sometimes lasting decades. The moment at which people require more assistance and support starts later in life, when their children already have grandchildren of their own. In such a family structure, increased caring responsibilities fall to the women wedged into the sandwich position, while they are often still in active employment.
Caring for parents is undeniably a role reversal, with children required to respond to the care needs of parents rather than the opposite. As such, this role often involves a conflict between dependency and non-dependency. Parents struggle against their need to be dependent on their children, whereas in the past children struggled against their dependency on their parents. The main challenge for children who take care of older parents is to understand their parents’ difficulty in accepting their dependency and to recognize the parents’ new needs. The emotional capacity to take care of a parent is known as “filial maturity” (Blenkner, 1965). This concept relates to the capacity of a mature child to accept and respect a parent’s weakness and to understand that she or he requires help. It also refers to a person’s willingness and capacity to assume the caregiving role and the responsibility it entails, while maintaining the boundary between the needs of the caregiver and of the parent.
Methodology
The current qualitative study was designed to gain an in-depth understanding of the experiences of working women who juggle the demands of multigenerational caregiving. A phenomenological-interpretive inquiry into how women themselves perceive their experience and attach subjective meanings to it was deemed the most suitable approach for this purpose, premised on the theory that a person’s very experience actively constructs how she, as subject, views the world.
The study population and the data collection
The study population included 20 working women, aged 57–67 years. All interviewees except for one were married and had families comprising children, grandchildren, and at least one living parent. Despite its relatively small size, the sample was heterogeneous in respect to the variables of economic class, education, and profession. The women were employed in diverse professions, such as teacher, school principal, nurse, beautician, speech therapist, librarian, HR professional, etc.
Interviewees who met the criteria were initially recruited through various Facebook groups, and the “snowball method” was helpful in locating additional subjects, when upon concluding the interview women would recommend another friend who was coping with similar circumstances.
Data was collected through semi-structured in-depth interviews, in which the subject is presented with a few predetermined, central questions, but the interviewer is allowed the flexibility and freedom to integrate new questions and to develop a dialogue with the subject as the interview proceeds. Most of the interviews took place in the interviewees’ homes, except in one case where the workplace served as the location. The interviews, which average an hour in length, were all recorded with the women’s consent and later transcribed, with a promise to strictly maintain the subjects’ anonymity and privacy with the use of pseudonyms. The study was approved by the Western Galilee College ethics committee.
Analysis of the findings
The analysis of findings in phenomenological research involves a process of organization and construction of knowledge from the collected data by breaking it into segments and units of information that are then recombined and re-ordered (Creswell, 2012). In the first stage of the research, each interview was read separately, analyzed and divided into primary units of meaning, to form groupings of information that appeared related to the same phenomenon. The second step was a comparative analysis facilitated by the cross-categorical reading of all the interviews based on the category divisions produced in the prior phase. The third stage was the construction of broad meta-categories constituting central themes (Giorgi, 1997). The organizing principle of the presentation of the findings below reflects the main themes that emerged from the interviews.
Findings
Work of One’s Own: “Work as a Protective Space”
One of the outstanding findings emerging from the interviews was the importance of work as a framework that allows women to “escape” the tasks involved in caring for the family. As one interview named Tamar put it, work provides a kind of “protection”: “As long as I am working, I have the protection of my job.” Two thirds of the women said that they are not asked to watch the grandchildren or take them to the doctor during their work hours. When they’re working, they may legitimately refuse requests from family members’ and thereby maintain boundaries. As long as they are at work, the women feel shielded from appeals for help, since everyone respects their work and knows not to bother them. Alice sais: “On my working days, they know they can’t ask, because I have my own life.” Work perceived as a “safe space” or “place of their own”, a “shelter”, where they can function undisturbed. Consequently, even if given the opportunity to retire and thus reduce their task load, they would consciously choose against this option and prefer to keep on working in order to preserve a place of their own, at least during part of their waking hours, to remain occupied with activities unrelated to family care. Rina, for instance, offered the following explanation: Working at the school is like having freedom. You are away from all the other things connected to your life. School is like a tidier corner, where I can get away from all the tasks I have to do. The moment I go inside the school gate, I flip a switch in my head and become entirely available only for school-related work … if I retire I won’t have the excuse that I am working and I’ll be entirely at the mercy of my daughters, and each time they will call me and say, the girl is sick, come and help out, and I’ll have to help them every day. My father also knows that when I’m at the school I can’t come to be with him and help him out. So, work sort of protects me and gives me some kind of quiet in the meantime. I feel as though I need the job, I don’t want to be at home all day, I do need the interaction with people, to get out of the house … I’m not so interested in being at home all day long and taking care of grandchildren. I need it for my health, this getting out, but it is certainly more demanding. Having work is what helps me on one hand, but on the other hand it is what creates a burden, it’s a larger load. But I don’t want to give it up. Yes, I think our age is the most complex age to be at.
Time for Yourself: “I Neglect Myself and My Body because I Have No Time for Myself”
A woman’s task load is sometimes described as a long race, a never-ending marathon. Eighteen interviewees told that one of the things that bothered them at this time of their life is the lack of time for themselves. They no longer feel young, and their bodies are changing and signaling that they should have a medical checkup and rule out any illness. But the incessant tasks that come along with the enlargement of the family and the arrival of new grandchildren relegates self-care to bottom-level priority, as Jenny reported: “I’m dealing with a medical issue and I have to take care of myself, but I don’t get around to it, I don’t have time, so I don’t go to get a checkup.” Abigail made a similar point: I’m not available for myself, for my body, I have no time for myself. I am so overloaded that I don’t grant enough importance to the changes going on inside me, and there are big changes at my age. But since I’m so busy with so many tasks, I’m not available to deal with myself or pay attention to myself, or to my body that is now going through so many changes. I have no time for that at all. I pay less attention to my own body, there is no time available for myself during these times, I just want to survive and get through this phase. Unfortunately, I see that it leads to self-neglect. I am literally neglecting my health and you know the body goes through all sorts of changes at this time of life. I haven’t done any medical tests for a very long time. And there is overeating. You know, food is comforting, there is a fitness center near my home, but I haven’t visited it, my energy is depleted. I am even ashamed of looking in the mirror. I don’t look in the mirror because I don’t get a good feeling doing it. I don’t even buy myself clothes, even though I really love treating myself to new clothes, I have no strength to stop by the mall, I have no interest in that. I am neglecting myself.
The Question of Remaining Time: “How Long Will This Go On?”
Another finding of the interviews was the sense that caring for parents has no end point and could go on indefinitely. Two-thirds of the women mentioned the significant psychological burden resulting from future uncertainties: first, about the degree of dependency their parents might develop in the future, due to deteriorating health, and second, about the length of time in which they are likely to need to take care of their parents. Compounding this issue, some of the interviewees were currently caring for one parent, but were uncertain about what the future may hold should second parent also require their care. In other cases, women had taken care of one parent for several years and are now taking care of a second parent, so that in cumulative terms, they feel they have been caring for their parents for a very long time. Abigail described the situation as follows: Unlike in previous generations, when parents required care for just a short time, nowadays it is a prolonged affair, there’s no time limit. Life expectancy is very high, and a long, intense period lies ahead, which could go on for a very long while. Very much on my mind is what lies ahead with my father and this could keep me occupied for another twenty years; I don’t know how much longer it will take and that’s what’s difficult about it. Don’t get me wrong, I’m glad that my mother is alive and I want her to live for many more years. But yes, I’ve been in this situation of being a caregiver for many years, because beforehand when my Dad was alive—he passed away in 2006—he was partially paralyzed then, half his body, and he was in that condition for eighteen years with a foreign worker (as caregiver) and I also took care of him. And now it’s taking care of Mom, which could last for many more years, it isn’t easy.
The Commitment Dilemma
The task burden at times creates conflict and a commitment dilemma—whose needs should be tended to first—those of the parents, or those of the children and the grandchildren? Does helping one side come at the expense of helping the other side? Whom should I be helping more? The study’s findings indicate show that in response to the concrete demands of aging parents versus children’s requests for help with grandchildren, grandmothers will rank the importance and urgency of the needs of each side and will offer help accordingly. Renee described the dilemma in regard to her father: “When his condition is bad, then it’s clear cut – I make myself available to help him. He needs me more than my daughter or the girls.” Similarly, Alice said: “It’s whoever needs more – if my mother needs helps and asks for it, she apparently has a greater need, because she wouldn’t ask for no reason. She’s a very independent person, and if she needs something, then she probably really needs it.”
Abigail added that she is constantly aware of the dilemma: I’m always conscious of it, and the question exists: who do I need to help first, for whom should I be more available? I respond not to my own agenda but to other people’s agenda. I respond to someone else’s events and I have no control over it. Clearly, my parents’ needs (come first), because they really need me, they wouldn’t trouble me for nothing, so it’s clear that if they need something, they are unquestionably in first place. Parents come first. One time my mother was ill, so my two other brothers and I, we split the eight-hour shifts and had a rotation, so I can ask my brothers if I need to. That way more people can share the burden, but with my daughter sometimes there is no one else who can help, because the two grandfathers aren’t always availableand energy, or finances—women recognize limits to their capacity to help everyone, and therefore helping one side will come at the expense of helping the other. Rose phrased this tension as follows: “I can’t split myself and be both here and there.”
Discussion: Women in Their Sixties within the ‘Double Sandwich’
Women belonging to the intermediate generation, in their sixties on average, fulfill multiple social and familial roles, as employees, mothers of adult children, grandmothers, and daughters of aging parents. But whereas in the past the role of grandmother was relatively clearly defined, its current definitions are fuzzier and characterized by ambiguity. How it is defined depends on different factors and on the grandmother’s will and ability to take on the role of caring for grandchildren. Moreover, as life expectancy has risen, the grandmother role has expanded to encompass caring for additional family members, such as aging parents. Thus, the ambiguity, fuzziness, and lack of definition of the caregiving role becomes an even more acute problem, since this role is now subject to different interpretations. So, for example, there is no clear definition of the frequency and scope of the caregiving that is offered, the length of time during which it is provided, or what kinds of assistance it encompasses. Furthermore, the caregiving role is performed voluntarily for the most part, unrewarded by pay or any other type of compensation. Without a grandparenting model for contemporary grandmothers and grandfather to cling to, the grandparenting role becomes flexible and dynamic. When the intergenerational contract is ambiguous, the confrontation between the divergent desires of the members of the different generations may lead to crises and conflicts over the degrees of assistance and involvement that are offered.
Caregiving within a multi-generational family becomes especially challenging at a time when increasing numbers of women in their sixties remain in the workforce, since this requires achieving the correct balance for combining caregiving responsibilities with paid work outside the home. If lifespans continue their upward trend, one may expect this issue to affect even larger numbers of women and men in their sixties who are simultaneously working and caring for young grandchildren, assisting their adult children financially and supporting their aging parents. The requirements of juggling paid work with multigenerational caregiving tasks have an impact on the day-to-day lives of women. As the study’s findings reveal, the enormous burden these women bear affects their health and results in physical neglect, fatigue, and psychological burnout. The intense frequency of caregiving activities on behalf of grandchildren and parents also carries a high price in terms of their social lives, since women often exclude themselves from social activities that compete with their caregiving duties. These findings parallel those of Halperin (2019), who claims that women in this phase of their lives experience a tremendous task load, perceives this life-stage as especially demanding, and reports a reduction in leisure activities and social ties, and sometimes speak of detrimental effects on their work.
Nonetheless, the findings do reveal that despite the feelings of stress and the burden of multiple responsibilities, this overload is not necessarily experienced negatively, but is frequently construed as a good experience and not as the role strain theory would lead us to predict. Despite the heavy costs of inadequate investment of time in their own well-being and professional advancement, the task load is not characterized negatively, and some even speak of it in terms of love and acceptance.
One of the study’s most salient findings was the perception of work outside the home. Whereas in Western societies work is frequently perceived as demanding and as a source of pressure, in the current study women perceived work as a safe place that protected them from the demands of different family members and enabled them to reserve a place for themselves. Indeed, work established for them the very boundaries that they were unable to establish for themselves. This finding is compatible with Crosby’s (1993) study of middle-aged working women, in which they described their work roles as the only ones that permitted them any independence beyond the reach of family demands.
The concept of “double sandwich” that I am proposing here intends to emphasize the double aspect of these women’s location in the sandwich. In other words, they are located between their elderly parents and their own children, but also between their elderly parents and their own grandchildren. This double-ness is also observed in terms of the implications of their “double-sandwich” location: the negative implications of task overload and psychological burnout versus the positive expressions of contentment and acceptance of their situation—their role is perceived as both a privilege and a duty. Calling to mind the simultaneously optimistic and pessimistic approaches presented in Katz’s work (1988) “Tension and enrichment in the roles of the working mother,” it is apparent that the working grandmother who cares for her grandchildren and her parents experiences both tension and enrichment. As Katz claims (1988), according to the optimistic approach, women ultimately prefer to integrate work and family despite the burnout and exhaustion, a point of view that is corroborated by the current study’s findings according to which women want to maintain their work roles alongside their caregiving tasks. This context highlights another aspect of double-ness expressed in their attitudes to work. Although work increases their task load, it simultaneously serves as a “safe place” and as protection from the demands of other family members. This explains the women’s lack of desire to retire or accept an early retirement, and their preference to continue working in order to maintain possession of one aspect of their lives that does not involve taking care of family members.
The double sandwich also creates a conflict of dual loyalties. Initially, the conflicting loyalties play out within the family, between loyalty to children and grandchildren and loyalty to aging parents. A second conflict of loyalties occurs when a woman commitment to home clashes with her commitment to the workplace. This conflict pertaining to women and young mothers, which has been intensively studied in the field work and family, does not evaporate as women get older but continues to accompany them even into their sixties. Women are obliged to seek a workable balance between their jobs and their duties to the family, even when their adult children no longer live with them. Indeed, they find themselves confronting the same dilemma they faced before the children left home, when deliberating the choice between helping family members or investing more of themselves in their work.
In terms of life course theory, the situation of women located in a “double sandwich” within a four-generation family is especially complex and interesting, because they are occupied with two life-stages or passages that frequently occur in temporal proximity: the grandparenting stage as well the stage of caring for the ascending generation. Furthermore, although the parental role does not terminate when older children leave the home, several studies indicate (Lavee & Katz, 2003) that parents generally experience some sense of relief when the sheer amount of domestic and childrearing tasks is reduced at the onset of the “empty nest” phase. The findings of the current study, however, present a different picture, whereby there is no reduction of the task load. The previous children-related tasks are replaced by tasks related to parents and grandchildren, sometimes for a period that may extend over many years.
The need to find balance between family and professional life, which accompanied women throughout their career, had not disappeared in adulthood and in some cases even intensified. Although there are no uniform characteristics for these four-generation families, so allegedly men and women are free to determine their involvement and willingness to care for their aging parents or young grandchildren, the established norm seems to be directed primarily towards women, relieving men from the caregiver role. The hegemony of the concept of motherhood in Israeli familial society perpetuates the division of gender roles even later in life.
In light of this, the findings of this study may be applied both to future studies and in practice, that is, to encourage greater involvement of men in carework by making arrangements that go beyond the accepted norm, for example, by making the work organization climate more family friendly and by amending legislation.
Finally, relationships with grandchildren and with elderly parents are characterized by intense emotional involvement and are expressed in a variety of patterns shaped by environmental and social contexts, the financial situation and health conditions of those involved, and informed by the nature of the intergenerational contract of a particular family. Families differ in respect to the degree of cohesiveness, commitment and solidarity toward their various members and in regard to the way in which women cope with the overload of role-related tasks.
Footnotes
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
