Lori shared her story as part of MECEP’s State of Working Maine 2024 report. Click here to read the full report.
Lori is the owner of a small neighborhood café in Portland. After running the café for 15 years, Lori recently announced to her customers that workforce shortages and the demands of caring for aging family members had led to her decision to close her business.
“I’ve really enjoyed running the restaurant, but now all I do is put out fires. If someone doesn’t show up, what are we going to do for the rest of the week? What are we going to do next week? And then I worry about how my mom is going to get to her doctors’ appointments because I have to be at the restaurant. It just feels like it never ends.
In 2021, we started noticing things weren’t right with my parents. My dad stayed in the hospital for two months while we waited for a long-term bed. He wasn’t fit to go home, my mom couldn’t take care of him, and we didn’t have anywhere we could watch him safely. A bed eventually opened up an hour away, but right after we got him moved in, my mom fell and broke her hip.
We couldn’t find any place where my parents could get care together. There are hardly any places that allow couples. Everywhere was full and had waiting lists. Being apart after living together for 57 years was very upsetting and confusing for them.
I spent a lot of time ignoring what was happening at the café because I just couldn’t focus on it. I was probably spending about half my time running the restaurant and the other half caring for my parents. Besides taking my mom to visit my dad every other day, there was insurance and legal paperwork, dealing with the VA, getting their house ready to sell. It was a lot. My husband left his job so he could help me run the restaurant, but he couldn’t help me full time. His mother had a stroke in the midst of all of this. Until she recovered, he lived with her for half the week, trading shifts with his brother to take care of her.
Since my dad passed away, I’ve had to work a lot more to keep the restaurant going. I’ve worked six days a week since June, which really cuts into the time I can spend with my mom. She calls me on the phone about eight to ten times a day. She knows I’m at work, but she gets really wound up and anxious if I don’t pick up. My mom has a lot of anxiety with her dementia.
When I first started helping my parents, I felt lucky because my job was more flexible. I could just shut down for a day if I needed to. I thought it was working. But then my staff started to quit. I didn’t realize how much I was relying on them to keep an eye on things. They were super stressed out and angry with me. After two really capable employees quit, I realized I wasn’t juggling this as well as I thought I was. And that’s when I started thinking about closing.
These have been the worst years of my life. I tell myself that someday I’ll be thankful I did this for my parents. I don’t regret it, but it’s just really awful, watching your parents die and trying to have any sort of life.
I don’t know what I’m going to do next. Since we announced we’re closing, a lot of people who have done caregiving have wanted to talk to me about that. I’m not the only one in this position.”
