I am firmly planted in the sandwich generation. For those of you who don’t know what that means, it means that I am raising a family and also taking care of a parent.

My mother moved in years ago to help us with the kids. We needed her.

Now she is sick, and fortunately already living in our home. She needed us.

But it is not so simple: I still need her. She is my mom.

Sometimes I see photos from years ago and it takes my heart for a ride—she was just so… available. My kids need me. We are an enormous puddle of need, with a whirlpool in the middle.

For those of you who are in this too, I see you. I see the work. The impossibly. To fact that you are not only taking the impossible, you are talking it double time. The needs are enormous. Medications, homework, caregivers, activities, puberty and dying. On there own, both roles are already too much. Way too much.

Sometimes I am angry. Sometimes I am selfish. Sometimes I have been so selfless I have disappeared entirely. Sometimes I just want to watch mindless TV because mindful is just the worst. Sometimes I want to scream. Sometimes I do.

Bittersweet is the perfect word for it, mainly because it is actually two words.

The bitter: there are days when my own crying wakes me up. I hear a hurt animal in my sleep, and wake to find it is me, and yes, I hurt. The bitter is hospitals, and counting pills, and resentments, and bad news, or worse, no news.

But the sweet, oh, those keep me going. The sweet is my mom surfacing and making the boys toast. The sweet is them still having their grammy in the basement to “run away” to when they are mad at their parents. The sweet is reading Dandelion Wine out loud and feeling the beauty and the light of story and summer and life and death too.

Bittersweet it is. Bitter sweet am I.

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About the Author

Elke

Elke Govertsen is a entrepreneur and founder of Mamalode. She has been featured in Real Simple, Forbes, Where Women Create, Ad Tech, and listed as one of Origin Magazine's "Top 100 Creatives." She has been a speaker at The Girls Lounge, Adweek, C2Montreal, HATCH, TEDx and (her favorite) in classrooms. She speaks on a variety of topics from entrepreneurship to overcoming obstacles. She loves consulting in the areas of community design, storytelling and brand building. Her special skills include extreme bootstrapping, overcoming obstacles and creating opportunities. Of the many things she has learned by doing Mamalode, her ability to work with absolute chaos/kids/mess just might be the best. She is learning that slowing down creates more impact.