Myths About Ageing Without Children

“Most people don’t look after their parents”

• The majority of the 6.5 million carers in the UK are looking after either a parent or parent-in-law (or both)
• A quarter of people aged between 45 and 60 provide active day-to-day support to their mothers and fathers, essential for them to continue living relatively independent lives.
• Most of the care for older people is not provided by the state or private agencies, but by family members. The economic value of unpaid care in England and Wales in 2021 – now estimated to be £162 billion – is almost a third (29%) higher than the value of unpaid care in 2011.
• However, as the baby-boomer generation ages, a growing ‘family care gap’ is developing as the number of older people in need of care outstrips the number of adult children able to provide it. This occurred for the first time in 2017.
• More than 80% of disabled older people receiving informal care and living in private homes are being cared for either by their adult children or spouses or all of them together. The ‘oldest old’ (85+) are predominantly cared for by their children, whereas married older people predominantly receive spousal care where their spouses are able to provide this.
• ​6.6 million people aged 40-60 (79%) who are considering caring for or supporting an older parent in the future, worry that they wouldn’t know how to support them (Age UK 2023)

“Their husband, wife or partner will support them even if they don’t have adult children”

Many people ageing without children don’t have a husband, wife or partner and are widowed or long term single. Even if they do, that person may also have health issues or become increasingly frail. It cannot therefore be assumed they can provide the same support as adult children.

In 2021, 3.3 million people aged 65 years and over were living alone in England and Wales, 30.1 % of the older population (ONS, 2021)

“People may not have children but surely they have other family to step in?”

Of course some people ageing without children do have strong familial ties with siblings, cousins, nieces and nephews but even if this is the case they may not be able to call upon them in an emergency or rely upon them to provide ongoing support.

There is also the growing phenomenon known as the rise in “beanpole” or vertically extended families caused by declining fertility rates and increased longevity and resulting in families where there are fewer children and multiple generations of older people.

“People who don’t have children don’t need to worry because they can afford to pay for private care with the money they saved not raising children”

There is a widely held assumption that people ageing without children are likely to have more disposable income and can use this to pay for care and support when they need it.

However older people who have not had their own families encompass a wide variety of backgrounds, employment history and income. Many are single supporting themselves alone and with no capacity to save for their old age. There is evidence that people without adult children lack readily available support in administering their affairs, completing forms, claiming benefits or moving house.

The ability to pay for care is only half the issue, the challenge is also the lack of advocacy and guidance on sourcing, arranging and managing care which is particularly an issue if you have dementia. Even people who are able to self-fund their own care often need more support then is widely available to do this effectively.

“Their friends will help”

There is an assumption that people without family will have alternative networks of support made up of close friends who they can turn to in a crisis. For some this may be true but networks of friends, neighbours and local community organisations are not there for everyone, and are harder to access as people grow frail, may not be mobile and have greater needs. The help and support of friends who are often in the same age group can decrease as people reach their 70s and 80s and beyond. For the oldest old most or all of their similarly aged friends may have predeceased them.

“I just assumed that you didn’t want children”

There is little research historically on why post-fertile women didn’t have children (and even less on men) but we know that around 10% of women made a positive choice to remain childless, 10% were unable to have children due to fertility issues and 80% due to a wide range of other reasons mainly social circumstances. For those who wanted children and were unable to have them for any reason, there may be continuing grief about their childlessness into old age which can add to the other challenges were now people ageing without children can face. Friends and family members becoming grandparents can often be a trigger for painful memories.

There are many, many reasons why an older person or couple may find themselves without the support of family as they age. We challenge the assumptions often made about childlessness and are more concerned about the potential impact this can have when people ageing without children become overlooked, invisible or have nobody to speak up for and support them.