A growing number of middle-aged women in Ireland are facing the stresses of caring for both their children and 
their own parents at the same time, a new study suggests.
A report from The Irish Longitudinal Study on Ageing (TILDA) shows that one third of women aged 50-69 in Ireland today are in the ‘sandwich generation’ who still have dependent children and whose elderly parents are still alive.
The study says that this amounts to 141,400 women living in Ireland.
According to the report these women provide “a range of financial and non-financial support to elderly parents, dependent and non-dependent children and grandchildren”.
The report, which is produced in association with Trinity College, finds that 58pc of ‘sandwich generation’ women give help to their parents and 83pc give help to their children.
One third look after grandchildren. Almost half of this group are providing this range of care and support while also in employment.
The report says: “The population structure in Ireland has changed with people living longer and delayed fertility leading to more women remaining in the work-force.
“This change indicates that the sandwich generation will become more relevant and more women will be caring for dependent children and elderly parents while also playing a more active role in the work-force.”
According to the report, women in this age cohort provide a range of supports to both parents and children, including:
– Half of substantial time support to their parents;
– One-third provide support towards basic and personal care such as dressing, eating and bathing (activities of daily living) for an average of 21 hours per week and more than half give household help with chores, transportation and shopping (instrumental activities of daily living);
– One-third provide practical household help including shopping and household chores to their non-resident adult children for an average of 12 hours per month;
– One-third look after their grandchildren for an average of 34 hours per month:
According to the report, this support can have an impact on women’s health. However, this impact varies depending on the type of help given, the report suggests.
For example, providing financial support to children is associated with improved self-rated health among the sandwich generation women, but providing financial support to parents is associated with increased depression among this group. Providing practical household support for children is also associated with increased depression.
Dr Christine McGarrigle, the lead author of the report suggested that these impacts could be the result of a number of different factors.
She said: “We found that women who gave financial help to their parents were twice as likely to also provide personal care, like dressing, bathing and feeding their parents.
“Thus the depression experienced by these women may reflect both the financial strain and the stress of informal caring for parents.
“Alternatively depression could be associated with the reduction in savings as a result of the need to provide financial support to parents, and subsequent worry among the sandwich generation women about their ability to provide for themselves and both their parents and children in the future.”