Michael's Blog: Valentine’s Beyond Romance

This Valentine's I'd like to celebrate inter-generational love (as in adult and elder parent). Yes, Valentines is really about Eros, the romantic love and maybe you will also get thoughtful posts about self love, perhaps a form of Agape, or unconditional love. C.S. Lewis wrote about the "four loves", drawing on the Greek language which apparently has four different words for love, aligning with different nuances. The other loves are Storge (familial love) and Philia (friendship love).

But this post isn’t about Eros or Agape. It’s about Storge love, the care that is long lasting and independent of Eros love. It’s the love we exercise when looking after family members, including our aging parents. After my dad died in September 2021, my mum carried on for nearly four more years, dying in 2025. Her last years were characterized by increasing dependence and a declining sense of companionship as she became more isolated due to physical limitations. Therefore my wife and I and my sisters endeavoured to visit our mum every day, or nearly everyday, that we were in Vancouver as sometimes there were other commitments, or we didn't want to share a temporary cold.

Sometimes my mum would feel we were exercising an obligation, but to the contrary, these were precious opportunities to share stories, reminiscence and experience our mum unfiltered by social norms or spousal judgement, although judgement isn't really the right word.

After my mum died, Lesley and I would sometimes joke after dinner, its time to visit my mum and watch Jeopardy with her. Fortunately, Lesley's mum is still with us and fairly independent I might add. We've made it our habit and pleasure to have Monday night dinners together with Lesley's mum, sometime at home and sometimes at our local WhiteSpot restaurant (among other visits during the week or weekend).

We have many friends in the process of looking after their parents. Some have invited their parents to join them at their home, some have parents who are able to stay a little independent, although some have parents who need full time care. In the past week, two friends (at least) have taken their aging parents to hospital for necessary medical attention.

If you are caring for aging parents be comforted that your are modelling Storge love and that is a gift to your family, both parents and children. What a privilege - to have living parents and to have the capacity to be there for them.

Happy Valentine's.