Would You Let Elderly Mom or Dad Move In? 

By Kim Margolis, Dayton Daily News 

May 8, 2009 

An online survey recently found that 70 percent of adult children would choose their mother over their father to move in with them if their elderly parents could not take care of themselves.

The survey was conducted by Zoomerang.com and included the responses of 300 men and women between 25 and 64.

Why the bias for mom?

Judy Kocevar of Kettering said she thinks the results don’t mean adult children love their mothers any more than their fathers, but had more to do with stereotypes on what men and women need.

She thinks the respondents decided their fathers could handle the relative isolation of a nursing home or assisted living, while the mothers would need the more social setting of a family household.

Kocevar does not think her own parents support that stereotype. She said her father would need a lot of nurturing after years of care by her mother.

“He’s used to a certain level of care,” Kocevar said, with a good-natured laugh.

Kocevar is very close with both her parents, but her relationship with her father grew as she got older. When she was a child, her dad John worked third-shift at Standard Register.

“As a child, it seemed like as soon as we ate dinner he had to go to work,” Kocevar said.

So she and her, brother and mother bonded, even going on vacation without their dad.

But when Kocevar lost both her grandfathers when she was in her teens, she made an effort to develop a stronger relationship with her father. They went on to watch car racing together, play putt-putt and go bowling.

Back to the survey, Kocevar said: “I don’t see how people would pick one or the other. They gave so much of their lives for you.”

More results

The survey also found:

• Daughters are more likely than sons to want their mother to move in. 80 percent of women agreed to take care of mom in their own homes while only 65 percent of men did.

• Of those surveyed, 30 percent did not want mom moving in at all. They indicated she would disrupt their lives, they did not have enough room, or they could not provide adequate care. Finances were not an issue.

• Dad was not exactly kicked to the curb, however. In the survey, 72 percent of daughters and 58 percent of sons said they would move dad in if could not take care of himself.

Surprising result

If you would have asked Dessine Fricioni, of Beavercreek Twp., who she would care for when her parents grew old, the answer years ago likely would have been her mother.

The two were extremely close, with the mother and daughter taking the train to visit family in Cambridge often and even taking a visit together to Greece in 1988. When Fricioni got married, she and her mother talked to each other long-distance at least three times a week.

So if faced with the decision to care for her mother, “I would have felt a deep, deep commitment to take my mother into my home.”

But that was not to be, as her mother died before the decision had to be made.

Interestingly, it was her father who moved into her home while he was battling cancer. She and her father were not close when she was a child, as he had a drinking problem and her parents went on to get divorced.

Dessine stayed in touch with her father, getting closer when her children were born.

“What I discovered was my father was a very laid-back guy who liked good conversation and who was uncomplaining,” she said.

As far as the belief that women nurture children more than fathers, Fricioni points to a new generation of men like her own son and son-in-law. Both men are “hands-on” fathers, who care for their children. Her son-in-law plans boating trips with his daughters and goes on golf vacations with his son. Fricioni’s son is divorced, but his daughter lived with him for a while after the divorce.

“I really want to say dads are so much more involved now,” she said.

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