Aging Boomers can't find caregivers in rural WA. Who can fill the gap?

What Rita Cooper did when both of her parents were diagnosed with cancer in 2016 might sound drastic.

She got out of her lease; found new schools for her sons; found new jobs for her and her husband; and moved her whole family from the Seattle suburb of Kent to Cashmere, the sleepy town near Wenatchee where her parents were living.

She bought a house, built a mother-in-law in the back, and moved her parents in.

“I have friends of mine — super sweet people too — [who say], ‘Oh, I could never do that,’” Cooper said.

Boomers in Central Washington, like Cooper’s parents, are growing older and needing more care. But their kids have moved away to bigger cities and there aren’t enough nursing homes and paid in-home caregivers to take care of everyone. This pattern holds true across the United States: Rural areas are graying a lot faster than urban centers, and there’s not enough elder care to go around. The Alzheimer’s Association estimates that Washington will need about 20,000 more paid caregivers by 2030 — concentrated in rural counties.

Rita Cooper decided the best option for her family was to become the caregiver herself and move her parents into her family’s home.