Aging into Poverty

Following is an introduction to a series I’m working on that will explore the realities of aging for women in Canada. While I understand this doesn't apply to all Canadian women, or just to Canadian women, I also know that I'm definitely not the only one facing these challenges. This is my story.

I’ve learned again and again that it doesn’t pay to worry about things that haven’t happened yet, especially if those things may never happen. However, my anxiety still nosedives into worry at every opportunity, and if I’m not in the perfect headspace to combat it, I quickly become the “poster child” for high anxiety and panic attacks.

(For those who’ve never had a panic attack, count yourself lucky because they can be quite scary, and oftentimes, at least for me, quite debilitating.)

My anxiety has been off-the-charts crazy for several years now, and unsurprisingly, the current global political climate is not helping. In addition to that, I’m now in my mid-50s and discovering that I’m not at all prepared for the nightmarish realities of being a single woman entering her senior years in an unhealthy capitalist society bent on exploiting the poor and, if some get their way, removing the rights of women.

And before anyone says it, yes, I do take responsibility for my current situation because it’s also a by-product of choices I made in the past. In some case I didn’t know better, while in others I was either left with few options or took a risk with the hope that things would turn out okay in the end.

For example, when my ex-husband offered me the opportunity to stay home with my daughter after she was born, I wanted to jump up and down and scream, “YES!” However, at the time I’d just graduated from university with a four-year history degree. I didn’t have a work history or anything to fall back on, as I had originally planned on returning to school for my master’s degree when I discovered I was pregnant.

I understood the potential long-term repercussions of taking myself out of the workforce. If my marriage ended, I would be in a situation where I not only didn’t have an adequate work history or connections, but I also wouldn’t have accumulated any financial safety nets in the form of work or government pensions.

Of course, I discussed this concern with my ex-husband at the time, and he promised me that no matter what happened in the future, even if our marriage ended in divorce, he would make certain that I would never need to worry about retirement. In that moment, I remember thinking that he’s saying this, and I want to believe him, and I think he maybe believes it’s true in this moment, but if for whatever reason our marriage does end in the future, there’s no way I can hold him to this or guarantee that he’ll follow through.

So, at the time, I saw two options: play it safe, refuse the offer, go back to school or to work, and hand my child off to someone else to raise, or take the risk, accept the offer, and take advantage of the opportunity to spend one-on-one quality time with my child every minute of every day for the foreseeable future. Clearly, being a new first-time mother who didn’t think divorce was likely, I chose the latter.

While I don’t regret the decision that I made to be a stay-at-home mom, (and later a homeschooling mom after getting my education degree), the risk I took didn’t pan out for me financially. My ex-husband did not have my back, then or now. The years I put in managing our home, taking care of our children, and helping my ex-husband with his work and personal ambitions, were not compensated above or beyond being given a place to live, food to eat, and the opportunity to spend unfettered time with my daughters.

At the time, I thought I should be grateful to my ex because it seemed like he was doing me a favour, giving me a gift, but in retrospect, I see it for what it was: unpaid labour. We were both working for our family, but he was the one whose name was attached to the monetary earnings, the pensions, the credit scores, and the networking-related benefits, including building seniority, all those things that help a person in the short-term and in the long-term, and especially in retirement. I now recognize that I wasn’t remotely adequately compensated for the effort I put forth to make his life (and our lives) the best they could be.

I feel the need to make it clear that while all this is true, I still don’t regret the choice I made. Being able to raise your own children, to spend time with them all day every day is a gift. However, if I were to do it again, I would insist on seeing a lawyer to draw up some sort of legal documentation ensuring I was adequately compensated in the event of a divorce.

But that’s not what I did at the time, and I do very much regret that now. By the time we separated and eventually divorced, my mental health and my ability to advocate for myself had fallen considerably, and in the end, it was my ex who came out on top after the divorce, leaving me and our children in a precarious financial position.

As you can see, while I did have some agency in this – I chose to stay home and be a full-time unpaid caregiver and housekeeper for my family with only a verbal promise that I would be cared for in retirement – there were also variables at play with circumstance beyond my control. I’d also like to point out that this is a rather common situation for many women.

Reality Checks:

In a June 2021 report of the Standing Committee on the Status of Women, Women’s Unpaid Work in Canada, Chair Marilyn Gladu wrote on page 11:

“Invisible and unpaid work in and outside the home are essential to Canadian families, communities, and society. Globally, and in Canada, women perform the majority of this work, which is undervalued and under appreciated. Also, women may face different challenges because of their unpaid work responsibilities. For example, women who perform unpaid work may have a double burden of unpaid and paid workloads, lower levels of labour force participation, less economic security, and negative mental and physical health effects.”

This document can be found at: https://publications.gc.ca/collections/collection_2021/parl/xc71-1/XC71-1-1-432-8-eng.pdf

And, if you’re a numbers person, or if you’re interested in learning more, check out what “Canada’s feminist approach to addressing unpaid and paid care work through international assistance” has to say on the matter:

“Globally, ILO [International Labour Organization] data suggests that 16.4 billion hours/day are spent in unpaid care work, the equivalent of US$11 trillion or 9% of global GDP, making it twice as large as the global agriculture sector.

Women aged 15 and above spend on average 3.2 times more than men on unpaid care work (this varies by region: 1.7X in Americans; 3.4X in Africa; 4.1X in Asia Pacific; 4.7X in Arab States, according to ILO data). A significant proportion of unpaid care work involves drudgery, which combined with time poverty can result in physical and emotional strain (sometimes known as ‘depletion’). The disproportionate responsibility for unpaid care work carried by women and girls restricts their opportunities for education, employment, political and social engagement, and leisure, affects their health, and deepens their vulnerability to poverty.”

This excerpt and more can be found at: https://www.international.gc.ca/world-monde/issues_development-enjeux_developpement/priorities-priorites/fiap_care_work-paif_prestation_soins.aspx?lang=eng