In the Philippines-where extended families share meals daily, church communities gather weekly, and people spend hours each day on social media-57% of citizens report feeling very or fairly lonely, according to Meta-Gallup's 2023 Global State of Social Connections report, the second-highest rate globally. Separate surveys suggest Filipino youth are among the loneliest in Southeast Asia.
One day at lunchtime, my dad was driving home from playing tennis with some friends and felt an unusual sensation - hunger. A McDonald's just north of our town had opened up several years before, but no one in our family had ever stopped there. Now, as he saw the restaurant's giant yellow M glinting in the sun ahead of him, Daddy felt a strangely powerful urge to stop.
As Teena Punjwani and Deepak Nasta take stock of the last year, they sigh. "I feel like I've lived too many lifetimes in this one lifetime," Punjwani said. The San Jose couple's life together was thrown into chaos in February with a heartbreaking diagnosis: their 5-year-old son, Jayaan, had brain cancer. His parents had sensed that something was off last winter, when Jayaan's writing skills nosedived at preschool and he mysteriously lost balance on the left side of his body.
Spurred by her mother's diagnosis, she had her first mammogram a couple days earlier, and it had turned up a suspicious spot. Now she needed a second, diagnostic mammogram, and likely a biopsy. She found herself walking a surreal sort of tightrope, caught between relief that her mother's treatment was over and fear that she might soon be starting her own.
I'm struggling with something I feel guilty even saying out loud: Watching my parents age is breaking my heart. I'm incredibly lucky as my parents had me when they were young. My mom just turned 60, and my dad is right behind her. But despite their age, they seem so much older than they should be. They give everything they have to their jobs during the day, and then come home only to collapse in front of the TV, eating DoorDash night after night.
It's been seven years since we were with my family on Christmas Day. Two of those years we were hunkered down at home with a newborn/about to give birth. The other five years we have spent with my husband's family. My father-in-law has been terminally ill for 12 years, and it's a miracle that he has lived this long. We've truly thought that every year has been his last Christmas, but this year, I really think it's his last.
Dozens of changes were quietly made this year to the National Strategy to Support Family Caregivers, which was first released in 2022 after years of work by government officials and community stakeholders. An objective to "prioritize efforts to advance equity for unserved and underserved populations of caregivers" was removed entirely, as was a section noting that the challenges of family caregiving are not equally distributed.
I've been a single mom for just over five years. My daughter's dad and I separated when she was six months old, and since then, I've dedicated my life completely to her. I haven't dated, traveled, or done pretty much anything "for me." Despite having joint custody, our daughter refused to sleep over at her dad's place, and they only saw each other once a week, during the day.
But through Facebook groups and GoFundMe pages, I began to connect with families going through similar ordeals. Despite the pain and relentless demands of their situations, many were open and generous with their time. That was especially true of Jessica Pittizola Jarrett and her son, John-Bryan, who goes by JB and suffered an anoxic brain injury and other complications after overdosing on fentanyl in September 2020.
His parents are Baby Boomers who, he says, exhausted their funds five years ago - although they only told him when they were on the brink of homelessness. Because of health problems and age-related constraints that make work impossible, the user stepped in to support them and to manage their finances. He persuaded them to sell their large, debt-laden home (despite their request that he simply continue paying their mortgage). Now they live in a modest cottage near him so he can regularly assist them.
Melinda Turner starts her day at 3:30 a.m., and within 30 minutes, wakes her 8-year-old daughter for school. She packs their bags and by 5 a.m., heads out to drop her child at an in-home day care - one of the few providers in her area that opens before dawn. Turner, a single mother, then drives to her early shift at a manufacturing job.
They had just talked the day before, Skyy Clark and his father having one of their usual conversations about life, basketball and whatever else popped into their minds. Early the next morning, around 6, Skyy got a call from one of his brothers. It was the sort of news no one can fully prepare for, no matter the circumstances, no matter how much one might have already considered the possibility of hearing those awful words. "Dad's gone."
My 34-year-old daughter, Samantha, has already chosen the song she'll perform at her twin brother, Matt's, wedding in May next year. She's refining her version of Bette Midler's "Wind Beneath My Wings." Not that it needs refining: it was the highlight of her solo concert, "Daring to Dream," last month. The event was a sell-out, and there was rapturous applause. The crowd's appreciation of Samantha made me prouder than ever.
The call came around 3 a.m. "Your mum had a stroke," I heard my cousin in India say. I crumpled to the floor. As I sat sobbing, he explained that she was in surgery and still critical. My mind swam with disbelief. Less than 24 hours ago, I had spoken to her over video chat. She'd been in high spirits singing Old MacDonald to her new grandson our daily morning ritual since his birth that April.
