How to manage sibling relationships strained by family caregiving

How to manage sibling relationships strained by family caregiving 
AARP; by Christine A. Di Pasquale; 11/25/24 
... Conflict around caregiving is not unusual, especially between sisters, says Megan Gilligan, Ph.D., an associate professor of Human Development & Family Science at the University of Missouri. Gilligan is a co-author of the longitudinal Within-Family Differences Study that looks at understanding the “relationships between parents and their adult children and grandchildren, as well as between siblings in adulthood.” Gilligan and her colleagues found that sisters tend to be more critical of one another than sons when it comes to parental caregiving. “Daughters are raised with a sense of expectation, obligation, of wanting to provide that care and wanting that care to look a certain way,” she explains. “And we found that when multiple daughters were involved in care, maybe sometimes they’re kind of stepping on each other’s toes whereas … sons were more likely to kind of step back and let sisters navigate that,” she says. ... Gilligan suggests that we replace the idea of equality with equity in caregiving. Siblings should ask what the parents want each child to do and then divide that work equitably if not equally in order to reduce sources of stress for the ailing parent and among siblings.