mhaze

Or the view of the world from the overly comfortable balcony of the over opinionated .
It’s a strange world.

Dan.

Diver Dan,

Sorry but that's way tooooo cryptic for this poor sole to comprehend.

On Nursing Homes....

Over the past two years I have held Enduring Guardianship for three octogenarians, being the main contact for the medical establishment for all three. One lives with us, one in a small unit in a retirement village and one in a nursing home.
Today one has become a nonagenarian and my mother passed in June.

She had been in a nursing home for two years. The decision to put her there had been wrenching and drawn out with all efforts made by the medical establishment and family to make living at home viable. But ultimately it was clear that she required 24/7 care.

Despite stories of people putting elderly family into these homes just so they could be rid of them, I didn't see any of that. Indeed, even after a year of trying hard to keep her at home, the nursing home and hospital authorities reviewed the case to satisfy themselves that all was above board.

She had advancing dementia and was therefore in a dementia ward. It's impossible to call these pleasant places, necessary as they are. But the care was superb and the staff mostly beyond reproach.
In her more lucid moments she demanded release but increasingly she sunk into a fantasy world which seemed vaguely pleasant for her.

She'd been battling a rare blood disease for 20 years but ultimately the drugs ceased to be effective. Over the last month she was heavily sedated and kept pain free. The last week she was basically in a drug coma. The nursing home had a special room set aside for those in their final throes and each member of the family had a chance to spend some time with her saying their farewells and assuring her it was OK for her to go. I was with her the night she just stopped breathing.

Many complain about these places, but I have nothing but relief that her final years were spent in the best place she could be, not just for her but also for her increasingly distressed husband, dealing with his own dementia.
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While she was in a dementia ward, the facility also had what is referred to by the medicos and others as a hostel. This was a place where the elderly could be housed and looked after when living at home is no longer viable but where 24/7 nursing isn't required. The people there ambulatory and able to tend to their own showering etc. But they are provided with meals and snacks. Entertainment of a sort is provided as well as regular outings.

The main advantage of these places is that it provides companionship. Don has clearly formed some friendships and I saw others in the hostel I'm familiar with who form tight bonds of friendship.

It is true that these places are often referred to as God's waiting room but its not quite true. These aren't places where people go to die, but just their last relocation. It's for people who have run out of options as to where to live. I know of some who've been there for a decade or more.

This generation of octogenarians and nonagenarians is unique in human experience. No society has ever been faced with the question as to what to do with a whole demographic that lives into its 80s/90s. We still have a long way to go to work that problem out but my own experience as regards those in my charge, is that we are doing a pretty good job.

mhaze

Sometimes life is shocking, and sometimes people are disrespectful.
“Let the dead bury the dead” a phrase attributable to Christ.
And it is not wise to assume everybody you engage with, will naturally fall into line.

Here is my view for a new age nursing home:
Issue Nuns Habits and reversed collars to the nursing home inhabitants, sack the staff and allow nature to have its way.

The number of elderly I see as I’m ticking along, that should be cared for in those facilities and aren’t, are effectively excluded on the grounds of affordability.

If it upsets a few of the more sensitive to be enlightened to real world realities, bad luck.

And just as a reminder of the struggle life is to those unwashed hordes, this past week I’ve been close (again and still), to two suicide attempts, both young women in their thirties.

That’s how our young are passing away. Less sop and more reality mate!

Dan

A bit late in the but the Philosopher who provided the inspiration for the website that I posted pointed out that most people essentially get brutalized by the system in the final years of their lives, especially in the case of the US. Jessica Mitford exposed the brutalities of the system in her classic book The American Way of Death.

But then again American "culture" in particular specializes in brutalizing every aspect of human life beginning in the womb and then through the birthing process, as babies, toddlers, infants etc - such brutalizing is described on this site http://www.wombecology.com and this site too http://www.ttfuture.org