A while back I was talking to a woman whose second parent had died the year before and she said it may sound strange, but she felt a bit like an orphan now.
“Margery” had grieved a lot when her father died seven years before, but at least she still had her mom. When her mother died, along with the grief came the realization she was now “alone in the world.” She still had a husband and three children, and she said she felt foolish about feeling like an orphan at the age of 52, but she felt that way just the same.
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Margery thought maybe some-thing was wrong with her. She imagined that other middle-aged people were more mature about their parents dying and didn’t feel like orphans.
But she has a lot more company than she imagines. In fact, when American writer Jane Brooks was staying at a bed and breakfast in Nova Scotia, her hostess said the house had belonged to her parents, who had died a few months apart the year before, so she “was an
orphan now.”
Brooks, who had lost her second parent a little more than a year previously, was struck by the statement and found it described how she was feeling. Like Margery, she was a little embarrassed to admit feeling like an orphan, but after hearing this woman describe herself that way, decided maybe she wasn’t alone after all. She wondered how many other midlife adults felt like orphans when their parents were gone.
When she began to talk openly about it, she found midlife orphans everywhere: her local deli, a clothing boutique and the library. She also found midlife orphans eager to talk because it was a topic that never came up in other conversations.
There are plenty of midlife
orphans. Every year more than five percent of the population loses a parent: more than one and a half million in Canada. In fact, by the time we reach 62, 75 percent of us have lost both parents.
Brooks discovered there is little written about losing our last parent, even though it is a given in the life journey. She decided to conduct her own research and put the word out she was looking for people to interview.
Far more people responded than she could handle, so she ended up doing 52 interviews. Interviewees ranged in age from 37 to 62 and came from a wide range of religions, ethnic backgrounds and walks of life. She reported the results of her research in her 1999 book Midlife Orphan: Facing Life’s Changes Now That Your Parents Are Gone.
What little other research she had found said that personal response to the death of parents doesn’t follow any set pattern, but the more people she talked to, the more similarities she saw: some subtle, others more pronounced.
She found that the feeling of being orphaned or abandoned is common when the last parent dies. It is usually followed by a period of introspection and self-evaluation. Old sibling rivalries often re-emerge as the adult children try to divide up the parents’ earthly goods. Even long-awaited inheritances may come with an unexpected load of guilt, sibling rivalry and mistrust.
When the last parent dies, our family of origin is gone. If our relationship with our parents was good, we grieve the loss of this part of our life. If it was a difficult relationship, any hope of changing things for the better dies with the parent. Things left unsaid can never be said now.
I don’t know how many men I have talked to over the years who regret they never told their dads they loved them, nor had their dads told them. It also confronts us with our own death. We realize, sitting in the front row at the funeral, that our turn in the box is next.
I am lucky. Both of my parents are still alive, but I know the day is not far off when they will both be gone and like Margery and Brooks, my sisters and brother and I will be orphans. I don’t know what that will be like, but at least I will know we are not alone.
Edmonton-based Noel McNaughton is a former broadcaster and rancher who lectures on farm lifestyle issues at agriculture conventions and for corporations. He can
be reached at 780-432-5492, e-mail:
noel@midlife-men.com, or visit www.midlife-men.com.
