When someone else’s life admin becomes yours

There are some parts of getting older, and of our parents getting older, that nobody really prepares us for. 

For both of us, one of those has been the point at which someone else's life admin starts becoming your life admin too. 

We've experienced that in different ways. 

Millie's story 

Millie has two disabled parents. One is in a nursing home and her mum is living independently but preparing to move house. 

Recently, Millie went to her mum's to find some paperwork. 

Her mum had always been incredibly organised. Everything was meticulously kept, everything had its place and she knew exactly where things were. 

But when Millie opened the filing cabinet this time, things had changed. 

Paper started falling out. Files were crammed with old and new paperwork. There were old suppliers mixed in with current ones. Her mum was even still paying for something she no longer had. 

And Millie sat down and cried. 

It wasn't really about a messy filing cabinet. 

It was the realisation that the incredibly organised, efficient woman she'd known all her life now needed help managing something she had always managed perfectly well herself. 

And there's a kind of grief that comes with that change too. 

Your parents are still here, but the relationship is changing. You miss the parents you had — the ones you always turned to for advice, reassurance and back-up. They still do their best to be there for you, but it isn't quite the same. Slowly, you realise that you're becoming the one who needs to step up and support them. 

It's a lot to get your head around. We were always their kids. Their babies. And in many ways we still are. 

But the roles are changing, and there's a sadness in that which we don't think we talk about enough.

Ros's story 

For me, it came in a different way. 

I lost my dad in 2019 and then my mum in 2022. 

My mum, like Millie's, had always been meticulous about organisation. She kept spreadsheets and files and had systems for everything. 

But in the last few years of her life, understandably, some of those things weren't kept as up to date as they once had been. 

After she died, my brother and I found ourselves rifling through concertina files, spreadsheets and paperwork trying to work out which information was current. 

Who was the latest supplier? Which policy was still active? Was this the most recent document? Had something changed since the spreadsheet was last updated? 

And you're trying to piece all of that together while also grieving. 

At the same time, there is probate to deal with, accounts to close, people to notify, paperwork to complete and, eventually, the family home to sell. 

It's a lot, and very hard to juggle everything on top of your own work and home life. 

And when you're in the middle of it, the last thing you need is another afternoon spent searching through paperwork trying to establish which electricity supplier your mum was actually with. 

The sandwich generation isn't just about caring 

We often talk about the sandwich generation as people caught between caring for children and ageing parents. 

But there's a huge amount of invisible life admin sitting underneath that. 

Bills. Policies. Accounts. Contracts. Renewal dates. Reference numbers. Providers. Appointments. 

And sometimes one person in a household has carried most of that knowledge for years. 

When circumstances change — through age, illness, bereavement or simply life — somebody else may suddenly need to understand it too.

Control and dignity matter 

There's something else Millie said that has really stayed with us. 

Helping somebody shouldn't automatically mean taking everything away from them. 

As our parents get older, there can be a difficult balance between helping with the things that are becoming harder and allowing them to retain control and dignity over their own lives. 

Technology should be able to help with that rather than make it more complicated. 

And perhaps that's one reason we're both so determined that Wilbert should remain simple.

This is part of why we're building Wilbert 

Neither of us wants to pretend an app can make ageing parents, caring responsibilities, bereavement or probate easy. 

It can't. 

But if it can make one small part of an already difficult situation easier, that's worthwhile. 

If the important information is organised. If you know where to look. If you can see what's current and what needs attention. If somebody else can step in when they need to without starting from scratch. 

That's the difference we'd like Wilbert to make. 

Millie said something at the end of her video that probably sums it up better than anything we could write: 

“If I can make somebody else's life just a little bit easier… this whole journey will be worth it.” 

For both of us, that has become very personal. 💚