Last night Greg and I had a 40-minute phone conversation about mum and dad. Despite the length of the conversation, we didn't make any real progress - other than to agree that in a couple of weeks he and Regan would invite mum and dad around for the day while I sneak in and do some clearing out in their house.

I've been thinking about the apparent intractability of our parents' situation for a long time now, and I've come to the conclusion that it is a nasty tangle of conflicting goals. It is because goals conflict that we cannot get a clear picture of where we want to go, how, when, etc. Some of these conflicts I've mentioned before, but it does no harm to review them together in one place.

Keeping things the same - making things better

The first conflict arises from our parents' inability to deal with situations they used to be able to deal with. We cannot change mum and dad, so we need to simplify the situations - make them easier to deal with. But we cannot do this without changing things, and mum and dad don't cope with things being changed.

Providing extra safeguards - leaving them their freedom

We want mum and dad to enjoy themselves and not feel controlled by others. But they can so easily endanger themselves that we have had to put a stop to life-long habits with things like money, cooking, and so on. They cannot be free and safe.

Helping - staying out of the way

Mum and dad frequently have episodes when they think they are independent and capable, and resent our 'interference'. But when we leave them to their own devices we often end up bystanders to a slow-motion car crash.

Getting help with helping - keeping standards up

Rachel, Greg and I cannot always be around to help, we've started to depend on the social services. The catch seems to be that once you do this, you have to accept a decline in what we consider to be key characteristics of the quality of help. For example: reliability, sensitivity, familiarity.

together for dad, apart for mum

And finally, the most topical of all the conflicts: dad is happier when he and mum are together, mum is happier when she and dad are apart. Irresolvable!