Netherlands Kinship Panel Study

[Dutch Uncle]

Today I read a newspaper article on (health)care support for the elderly by family. Something the government here wants to promote, since healthcare-costs are skyrocketing with the aging population. (As it is in many countries)

This is going to be tough and difficult to achieve, according to researchers of the Netherlands Kinship Panel Study, which has surveyed 8000 people since 2002.

The snippet I want to post here I post as much for myself as for others who have strained relationships with FOO-members:
According to the study 40% of the parent-adult children relationships are "not harmonious", and half the siblings have "limited, bad or no contact at all" between them.

Every bit of validation helps.   

[Kizzie]

That is shockingly high   

[Dutch Uncle]

Yes, it is.

I should perhaps add that this relates to parents who are elderly (in their 70's, 80's and up, presumably), their kids (and thus the siblings) have FOC's themselves, might have moved away from the parental home/village/city/state for job-reasons etc.

For example the definition of a "harmonious relationship" (between adult child and parent) is defined as "at least once a month a phone-call AND a physical visit, and that in the last three months at least once help was exchanged* in whatever form."

*) personally I noted the "exchanged". That doesn't mean "given by the adult child to the parent"

Another snippet: "The study argues that family-relatioships appear to be iron-cast: If contact is distant, conflictuous or intimate, then ten years later it still will be. Flexibility to increase contact when sibling or parent becomes dependent on aid is rare. Patterns have become too ingrained."

[Annegirl]

This is interesting and totally understandable. The parenting style needs to completely change. And not just in the Netherlands.
My husband is from the East and they always are happy to look after their aged parents, he and his older brother helped their grandparents and did all the 'aged care' responsibilities and he always looks back on those times fondly.
I believe it has to do with one question parents need to ask ourselves/themselves. "which question is more important to us as parents?
How can i get my child to do as i say? (Which is generally more popular in the west)
or "What does my child need and how can i meet those needs?" Which from my own observation in Eastern countries they celebrate the child so much more as a whole person blossoming in their own unique way rather than trying to "MOLD" them into something the parents think they should be or act like.