As I was standing in line the other day waiting for my turn to check out a load of groceries I was unashamedly eavesdropping on two women behind me. They were discussing a friend with an obviously fairly new baby. The gist of their conversation was, "That baby is 8 months old, and she's never left him. She and her husband haven't been out alone for even an hour since before he was born. If she doesn't get a grip pretty soon she'll be a single mother in the loony bin."

Interesting, I thought. We encourage young mothers to leave their children (in the hands of someone competent and trustworthy, of course) to take care of their own needs and the needs of their other family members. There seems to be social agreement that when a mother takes care of her own physical and emotional needs it benefits everyone in the family.

And yet, even though as parents we used the services of a babysitter, or a co-op, or day care, as caregivers to the elderly we put those same needs on hold indefinitely. What gives?

Caring for an aging adult is much like caring for a child in the amount of responsibility it can entail. Like caring for a child, it can turn into 24-hour duty. But healthy children grow up, and that duty gets physically less difficult with time. Unlike caring for a child, caring for an adult is likely to get more difficult with time. If you deny your own needs, your ability to give good care diminishes as the need for care grows. This is certainly a recipe for disaster.

Just as young mothers regularly take advantage of sitters and other resources, so should you. Mothers Day Out and pre-school programs are there for a reason, and adult day programs for seniors are there for the very same reasons.

Even Mother Theresa closed herself off from the overwhelming demands of the dying every day to pray and replenish her soul. Are we any less human than Mother Teresa, that we shouldn't need replenishment, as well?