f the tables have turned and you are taking care of your parents as they once took care of you, you're not alone. Readers from across the Triangle wrote in to share questions, frustrations and advice. Despite the years of hard work, sacrifice and conflict, many felt blessed knowing that they had found a way to honor their mothers and fathers.

Devotion shines through the ups and downs

My mother has lived with our family for most of the past dozen years or so. My father was disabled for many years, and my mother was getting ill taking care of him -- a common caregiver statistic. My parents moved to Houston to be near us; my father died a few years later -- his nursing home sent him to the hospital a few days before he died in 1996. A hospital chaplain was instrumental in our family's decision to remove him from a ventilator. He died peacefully a day later.

Fast forward to New Jersey, New York and then to North Carolina four years ago. My mother is now 88 years young. Until last year, she crocheted lap blankets for senior citizens who were shut-ins or in nursing homes -- her personal ministry for over a decade. She considered herself an active senior living with our family and helping take care of all of us -- doing laundry, cooking, great baking and -- oh, yes -- using the leaf blower occasionally to clean off the driveway.

But my mother's memory loss was getting more noticeable -- confusion about days of the week, repeating the same stories or asking the same questions, needing more supervision in the kitchen and laundry. We had good support, however. My friends came to play Pokeno with us now and then, and we found great stimulation for her at the Durham Center for Senior Life. There is a dazzling array of things to get involved in there, but her favorite was just talking to her peers, doing her crocheting there, and teaching a few of the members and watching others. We found great sitters who could come to our home as often as we needed.

There were ups and downs, but overall we were managing very well -- routines, senior friends, sitters, stable health. Look out -- here comes a change: a weapon-related delusion, hospitalization for two weeks and then a change in living decision. What was best for all of the family? I was not ready for the larger assisted-living centers and was pleased to find North Carolina has family-care homes: houses in our neighborhoods that place no more than six people in a homelike environment. After calling and visiting several sites, we found an opening in a newly built family-care home sponsored by the state in a new subdivision not far from our home. With resistance, Mom moved. The first month she held court nightly with Pokeno games, dominoes and teaching crocheting. Then she wanted to start cooking. There was some confusion about the lap blankets she made and gave her housemates: According to her, they were "taken" without her permission. But the owners of the home handle these issues with grace and diplomacy; they see the home and the care of these ladies as a privilege.

Yes, raising seniors is a challenge, just like raising children was for them. The role reversals are confusing and challenging, but we have been rewarded with new relationships, new stories and new possibilities.

Terrie Reid Payne

Durham