You'd never dream of raising a hand to your children and you always swerve to avoid hitting wildlife crossing the road but could you commit elder abuse? I hope your first reaction is an emphatic and indignant No'. But what goes on behind closed doors isn't always as rosy as we'd like to imagine, especially when those doors belong to your own relatives. Elder Abuse is one of the very last taboos that even the coarsest of club circuit comics don't joke about.

Could you cope when Dad starts wandering the streets unshaven and dribbling at both ends? What about if Mum-in-law becomes an insomniac obsessed with opening and shutting doors like an overwound cuckoo clock? How respectfully patient will you be when Mum doesn't want to eat foreign muck' and Uncle Bert has become more belligerent than your teenage sons?

When does indulging independence become neglect or abuse? Would you take out-of-pocket expenses from your infirm parents for domestic and gardening services rendered? Could you walk away from your dear old difficult Mum when her cupboards were bare and she's clearly malnourished? Would you tell yourself it's only natural for old people to lose weight and look bony?

Beware the simmering resentment and frustration of young lives hampered by reluctantly meeting traditional expectations to care for their elders, who are living longer than ever before. Have you overheard that patronising tone, the belittling question or the supercilious air of the adult child who finally knows better than their elders?

Did that parent take that tone and begrudge their time to their toddlers and teens? Did they abuse their children? Is this payback time? Is that why so many old folk are on the receiving end of disrespectful intolerance?

Have you seen that visible impatience or embarrassment displayed by the sons and daughters who begrudgingly do their duty by taking their old folk out in public? Have you ever asked yourself how they reward themselves for their service? Don't be surprised if it involves dropping unsubtle hints about what they'd like and then allowing their senior to pay for it as a gift for their troubles'.

Three generations of my typically English middleclass family have fought for their King / Queen and country but this didn't stop elder abuse creeping in and spoiling the last years of our old and bold. You'd never have guessed that the most articulate, educated, religious and well travelled professional of the family was the abuser. There is no stereotype so please don't ever smugly assume it couldn't possibly happen to your family.

Learn more about this author, Sarah J Palmer.
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