04/04/2025
Monday, I was blessed to join my mother to celebrate her 102 birthday. I moved her to Mississippi from Alabama in 2017 to live with me. In March she transitioned to a nursing home.
According to AARP, about 470,000 Mississippians provided an estimated 400 million hours of caregiving worth $4.7 billion dollars in 2017, o parents, spouses, partners and friends. Those numbers have likely increased since then.
In an on-going series Mississippi Edition on MPB, will share my interviews with a business that employs in-home caregivers, those who do the work, families that are providing care and services the State of Mississippi provides.
For me, caregiving is a labor of love, hard work coupled with commitment. It can feel daunting too. Clearly the numbers show I am not alone. Hundreds of thousands of you in Mississippi, just like me, are providing care.
Despite the challenges I celebrate the opportunity to be a caregiver for my mother and kudos to every one of you who has been a caregiver, provided support to a caregiver or is one now.
There is comfort in knowing you do or have done the best you can for a loved one or friend.
And…just think, if you’re not a caregiver now, you may be one in the future or need one yourself.
We all need each other.