What to Call an Adult Who Has Lost Both Parents?

Hello, welcome to A Way with Words.

Hi, Grant. This is Alice Meany calling from Atlanta, Georgia. How are you?

I’m fine, Alice. Glad to have you on the line. What’s going on?

I have a question about orphans. My mother-in-law were watching some daytime soap opera, and someone made mention of a kid being a half-orphan. So we just kind of joke and were like, you can’t be a half-orphan. That makes no sense.

So we started talking a little bit further, and I was like, well, is there a word for an adult that has no parents? Because that doesn’t seem right either. Like, if you’re an adult, are you still an orphan? So that’s my question. Is there a word for an adult who has lost both of their parents?

So a half-orphan is someone who’s either motherless or fatherless? That’s the context they were using it in, yes.

I see. Okay. And so you’re wondering if there’s a term for an adult who loses both parents fairly early in life, not necessarily childhood.

Or at any point, right? Why can’t you be 70 and lose your parents and still be kind of orphan?

Well, yeah, that’s what my husband said. I was saying for myself, my parents passed away before I was technically an adult, but I was like an older teenager. So I was like, well, was I like only an orphan for like a year? And what am I now? Because I still don’t have parents.

Huh. I don’t know of a specific word for that. I’ve heard adult orphan and elder orphan for older ones. I’ve also heard midlife orphaned and just orphaned adults. It’s a kind of ordinary English phrase.

Yeah. I mean, the word orphan throughout the centuries has tended to apply to children, not always. And by children, meaning people who are under the age of the majority, not just simply the offspring of another person.

Right. That’s one of the problems that a child can mean an adult, right? Because you are still the child of your parents, even if you’re 28.

Yeah. Right. And it is a particular state that I think deserves some kind of recognition. I’ve lost both my parents, and it’s quite a step in your life.

Exactly. Yeah, and it’s also kind of a feeling of like you are, there is a kind of a loneliness about it where it’s just you. And it’s more so of that feeling where when you’re a kid and you think, when I’m an adult, I’m going to understand all this, but I kind of feel like you never really have that, oh, I’m an adult all the way on my own until you have that kind of realization where it’s like, oh, no, I’m literally on my own.

Right, and I’m literally next.

Right, exactly. Easier with siblings perhaps or aunts and uncles who are still around.

Right. I don’t know.

Oh, I’m sorry, go ahead.

No, go ahead.

I feel like maybe it would be easier with siblings, but not necessarily aunts and uncles because they’re not my parents. Like, I have aunts and uncles, but they’re not. It’s not the same feeling.

Yeah, it feels like the next generation coming to the top, you know?

Yeah. It’s significant. It’s a significant feeling. Infantry moving up to face the enemy.

Yeah, yeah. You’re now on the front line.

I hadn’t thought about that.

Yeah. Yeah, well, I wonder if anybody else listening has a thought about that.

I hope so. I’d be really interested to see that.

Well, if you have a suggestion for us, a better term besides adult orphan or elder orphan, give us a call, 877-929-9673, or send it to us in email. The address is words@waywordradio.org.

Alice, thank you for your call. We really appreciate it.

Thank you so much. Love the show. Thanks, guys.

Thanks. Bye.

Bye.

Bye-bye.