Sandwiched Boomers, Family Problems and Resilience

As Sandwiched Boomers, your issues may not be as dramatic as those of Elizabeth Edwards. But you're likely dealing with aging parents and growing children, perhaps marital problems or your own health concerns. Working through the impact of such changes is important to the well being of your family in flux and to yourself. Any crisis in the family is usually accompanied by heightened and mixed emotions. And finding ways to calm down and reconnect are important aspects of resilience.

What sort of effects do you experience in a family crisis? One reader emailed that she bounces back without too much effort: "That's not to say that things don't get me down, but I try to look on the positive side and I don't stay down for long."

When facing a difficult family situation, see if this tip can help you get your resilience going:

It's often hard to fathom what you have to give up when there are family problems. Is it feelings of control and invulnerability, your sense of identity or wellbeing, expectations of what the future will hold? Try to understand your complex emotions and then begin to explain the depth of them to those who care most about you.

There's a fair amount of attention being paid to Sandwich Generation month on the Internet. And that got us thinking about how overwhelming it can be especially in times of family crisis - a parent diagnosed with Alzheimer's, an adult child out of work and moving back home - to wade through tons of material just to be informed.

Stress resulting from information overload is the order of the day. So let us tell you about a service that has been extremely useful to us - it called Google Alerts. It's a innovative time-saving tool that will save you hours of repeating the same topic search over and over again. You can have articles brought to your attention with little effort on your part.

What are they? Google Alerts are email updates of the latest relevant Google results, whether on the web or in the news, based on your choice of query or topic - for example, Sandwiched Boomers, aging parents, empty nest, boomerang kids.

To get connected to this free service, just go to Google and search for Google Alerts. Fill out the form with your particular requests - the subject you want to monitor, the search terms, how often you want to be alerted and your email address where messages are to be sent. You will be introduced to Internet resources, both personal and academic, and your job will be to focus on the material that is most helpful to your particular circumstances. And let us know once you've tried it.