Customer Reviews

Another Country: Navigating the Emotional Terrain of Our Elders

5 star:		(30)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I have just purchased 4 copies of Another Country to send to friends and relatives. My copy was purchased at the DesMoines Airport, as I browsed in the bookstore with my mother in law (91) in her wheelchair, returning from a nostalgic trip to Mom's family farm and a reunion with her 93 year old brother. I cried as I read the Introduction (almost poetry!) and thought, "someone understands us!" Beautifully and carefully crafted, Mary Pipher's book does a stunning job of recreating the peaks and valleys of aging, family relationships, and the growth of us all as we age, both as parents and children of aging parents. As I read it my only regret was that she didn't interview my own parents, married 61 years, living in their own home and still mentally alert and vital aging "young-olds". She could have learned from them some valuable lessons, as I have, about aging and dignity, remarkable people who have remained flexible, loving and marvelous role models for my own aging process. The book was a catharsis for me as the child of aging parents but it was also hopeful, positive and offered new ways to think creatively about aging. I highly recommend it to all.

I cried, I laughed and I sighed at the grim truths and revelations in Mary Pipher's book on aging and the place held in our society by our elderly citizens. I folded so many page corners over for review that the book looks like a favorite old cook book. I wish I had read this book before my parents entered old-old age. I was not raised with any grandparents nearby, so had no examples for what to expect and how to deal with and care for aging parents. Growing old with dignity and dealing with declining health and eventually death is the hardest passage of our lives. None of the other passages as individuals, parents or spouses can compare to these challenges. Adolescence, puberty, child-birth, child-rearing, divorce...all seem like a walk through the park in comparison.

Having said that, we all need to read the book before our parents reach the old-old phase (although who knows exactly when that might happen). If you're in your 40's or 50's, chances are you should be reading this book. Although the book doesn't provide any recipes or procedures for dealing with the issues of the aging, it does provide valuable insights and suggestions into attitudes, fears, and concerns of both the aged and their care-givers.

We just assumed that mother would ask for help when she needed it, but her pride, reluctance to communicate and fierce need to be independent would not allow her to admit how needy and frail she had become. We finally discovered how badly she had deteriorated (although she still wouldn't admit it), and are still regretting that we didn't intervene sooner. She's now in a convalescent hospital, sometimes stoically accepting her condition, but sometimes angry, depressed and resentful. I'm sure I'll pick up the book and read it again as we find our way through this passage. And then when I become a young-old and finally an old-old, hopefully I'll be able to remember the valuable life lessons I'm acquiring now.

I read this book wanting to have a better understanding of what my parents might be feeling as they enter old age. Their health is starting to decline, yet they want desperately to maintain their independence. It seems irrational. Why not enjoy prepared meals and cleaning services of assisted living when you can afford it? Pipher's book answered my questions. It isn't fun to reach what she calls old-old age when health declines and one needs assistance with some of the daily routines. Yet our culture makes it difficult to ask for help and even harder to accept it. Pipher shows how the baby-boomer generation and their depression-survivor parents differ, and the "great divide" is psychology not technology as one might expect. She addresses the realities of care for our elders and encourages family communication and geographical closeness. In the last chapters, she seems unrealistically optimistic about families caring for each other and a bit preachy on that idea. But she does give much useful information on understanding our elders and some good advice on communicating with them.

This is a vital guide-book for those of us with aging parents.

As the middle-aged child of an often difficult mother, I came to understand the that the reasons for nitpicking or explosive criticism often are that a parent feels unneeded and by-passed. Since I am not one who easily picks up on these types of non-verbal clues but, rather, expects a direct request or expression of what's on someone's mind, I was having a hard time understanding this anger and bitterness.

Basically, we and our parents speak entirely different languages. I am grateful for this book to help me translate. All of my family, young and old, will be the healthier for it.

Mary Pipher's books are a whole cut above the self help genre, because they look perceptively at the whole social context of problems, so that we recognize the massive currents around us. Like Silent Spring, Children First (Penelope Leach), and other epochal books, they answer the big questions of a generation. Another country is painful, honest, gutsy and real, yet it offers real direction and tools for this issue that is so important to those of us with ageing parents.

Which of course, is everyone. One of the three or four really original voices in American social sciences, with a knack for matching the personal and the bigger picture.

They raised us on Dr. Spock. Not the pointy-eared Nimoyian character on Star Trek! Dr. Benjamin Spock, the Baby Doc! And Mary Pipher has done for the children what Spock did for our parents - answered perplexing questions like "Why do they do that?" and "What can I do?"

Pipher's thesis is that "Knowing when people were born allows us to predict attitudes and behaviors. A person from a specific era will have a certain `collective consciousness.'" She explains that we dwell in "different cultural time zones." This explains, for instance, why Mom and Aunt Em save all those few tiny bites of leftover food that they then leave in the refridgerator to turn green - the hoarding tendencies wrought by the Great Depression and rationing on the Homefront during World War II.

I am currently moving my parents to an Assisted Living Facility and this book is an important resource. I highly recommend it. Reviewed by TundraVision.

Again, Mary Pipher excels in captivating her reader, not only with her knowledge but with interesting case histories. She looks at the elderly from many viewpoints. Sociologically, historically, and as wonderful human beings struggling to understand the next generation. I particuliarly enjoyed the passages about how my generation (raised in the 50's and 60's) spends so much time discussing feelings while the older generation spent time learning skills which promotes self-esteem. She discusses the importance of community and how to respond to our parents with dignity. Well worth reading.

I have taken care of my father-in-law and my grandmother. At times their point of view on issues and decisions they made did not make any sense to me at all. This book helped me understand the differences in our generations. The older generation was shaped by experiences I never had. I began to talk to them about what their lives were like, which helped me understand their point of view. We still did not agree on everything, but we could relate.

I feel I owe large debt of thanks to Another Country.

It's been years since I've taken a highlighter pen to a book (college!), but this one has already taught me many ways to rethink my relationship with my parents as they age. The case studies and explanations reflect a lot of what I've been feeling. I believe I can refer back to them often for help and guidance. Mary Pipher's done for caregivers what she accomplished for adolescent girls in "Reviving Ophelia," and has my utmost respect as a writer and as a person.

I guess I'm writing this as the voice of at least one more person who is definitely dealing with intergenerational problems. Elder care is as much of a family issue as child care--if not more so, since everyone has parents and not everyone chooses to have children. It's nice to know we're not alone.

In "Another Country," the acclaimed Mary Pipher of "Reviving Ophelia" discusses the issues surrounding caring for the aged, and aging itself. Her explanations surrounding the cultural gap between the baby boomers and their aged parents are interesting, as are the case studies, which are just grim enough to be realistic.

A minor flaw is that the book is very much focused on the boomers and *their* aging parents, which makes its appeal to the non-boomer audience limited. Added to which, she does not cover the poor, destitute, or those who have no one to support them. A good book, if not as complete as it might have been.