My mom helped my grandma take care of grandpa until he died , and is now trying to take care of grandma as she isn ' t doing so well either . This is hard , since they live in different states , so my mom has to take multiple trips throughout the year and trade off with her other siblings . It ' s hard , and even though she does it , she does not wish the same on anyone else . She told me straight , without me ever even bringing it up , that she does not want me doing the same for her and presumably my dad . They ' ll take care of themselves for as long as they can , then , I presume , fine a nursing home or something . Just how they plan to pay for this , I have no idea . Regardless of the offspring ' s willingness to do so , it should never be their responsibility to take care of their aging parents . Children do not choose to be born and owe their parents absolutely nothing for it , regardless of circumstances . It would be unfair and unreasonable for a parent to expect and depend on their offspring ' s support . Children are NOT retirement plans . And they ' re not even good retirement plans even when they are willing and able anyway . 1 . Just having kids ages people . It ' s likely the parents would be healthier longer if they never had kids . 2 . Children are poor investments . They cost far more to raise than saving for retirement would . 3 . There is no good reason to expect quality care from offspring as it is unlikely they have the proper training and qualifications to deal with much . Plus , the more time they spend taking care of their parents , the less time they ' re able to spend at work , therefore the less they ' re able to afford to care for their parents . So not only would putting that money towards saving for old age be a better use of money , the quality of care is likely to be better as performed by professionals who are always present or oncall .