This old age hehn! Tara Aisida

“Lawyer this old age ehenh! Hmmmm…” were my client’s response to my enquiries about his health and well being during a pre-trial meeting we had shortly before his 80^th birthday. He continued “I was praying to grow old but I wasn’t really aware of the realities of old age and the different set of problems it brings. Everywhere aches, I can’t sleep for long and I am just tired. I didn’t know it will be like this,” he concluded.

My client died shortly after that meeting, some two months after a lavish party he had thrown for his 80^th. As I was told, he was feeling a bit weak and went to the hospital near his home but never returned alive. I must say that he was one of the lucky ones. He died with a sharp, focused and fully functional mind, not being hampered in any of his bodily functions and without much physical debilitating pain.

I know of other adults that are not so lucky, for I have friends whose parents are suffering from dementia and who can’t recognise them. I have friends whose parents are in and out of the hospital complaining either of the effects of old age or suffering from a long term sickness like cancer. I have friends whose parents have suffered stroke, falls, and glaucoma resulting in blindness which have led them to be immobile and totally dependent on help from others to perform their basic daily bodily functions.  

In recent times, my client’s words, coupled with the condition of some of the old people I know, have made me wonder at the vagaries of life and to begin to consider what plans I have for my old age. It wasn’t too long ago that I thought that caucasians who put their aged parents in assisted living or old peoples’ homes were selfish, uncaring and unfeeling. As far as I was concerned, buoyed by the curses rained on children who abandoned their parents in their old age and the films depicting nursing homes as dreary places where old people were left to die, placing one’s parents in a nursing home, retirement centre, assisted living no matter their ailment was a taboo.

However, the coming of age and the practicalities of life have mellowed my strongly held opinions. I can say that my beliefs are changing and I am beginning to embrace the idea of living in a retirement community and/or assisted living. The reasons are not so far fetched:

1.  I, like many of my friends have children who are thinking of settling outside the country and who have no hopes of coming back home to live or work. It is a reality that most of us will live out our old age without the luxury of having our children at our beck and call like we were at our parent’s. In addition, even if we were to live in the same country as our children there is the possibility that we will not live in the same house because of our independent nature and the complexities of our relationships. I know friends who have had to rent homes and pay for live-in companions for their parents who lived abroad with them.
2. By the time I am in my seventies,  my children will be in their middle ages caught between two generations- me and their own children and it will difficult especially if I were to be suffering from ill health for them to juggle being a care giver with raising a family, working full time and their social obligations.
3. Unlike our parents’ time when there was a battalion of extended family members one could call upon to help care for ailing or young persons, it is increasingly difficult to find extended family willing to live with one’s aged parents as everyone is more independent, focused on their own lives and not willing to serve their kinsmen.
4. It is difficult and expensive to find good and skilled professional help to take care of the old and young mainly due to our poor work ethics or the greed and avarice of most people who will not hesitate to steal from, harm, maim or murder those in their care. A case in point is that of a friend who caught her mother’s caretaker wearing her mother’s jewelry the mother being a dementia patient. When challenged, the caretaker had the guts to say that the jewelry was a gift from my friend’s mother. Another is the case of a former governor’s mother whose maid strangled her and stole from her before fleeing the house. 
5. As much as we may not accept it, our children are not as compassionate as we are to our parents and are therefore not likely to show us in physical terms their love and appreciation. They will take care of us, but will not inconvenience themselves greatly on our behalf. There is therefore the likelihood that unless we store away social capital we may end up suffering from loneliness and a lack of companionship in old age.

The truth is that even in the developed countries, children and parents baulk  at the idea of retirement centers and nursing homes and many children who have put their parents in one are filled with guilt for “abandoning” their parents but it is only practical to know when one has reached their limits in terms of caring long term for a sick loved one due to caregiver burnout that can affect our bodies, our relationships with our partners or our mental health, the need for specialized healthcare which we are not equipped to render, or when one lacks the space and time required to take care of aged parents.

Assisted living or a retirement community is not so much of a bad idea once we can get our minds round it. It doesn’t necessarily mean that our children will abandon us when we live there. The truth is that it can provide us with good friendships, companionship, new hobbies, daily activities to keep our bodies and minds agile and less expensive healthcare. As I recently discovered, there are a good number of nursing/retirement homes springing up in the country as more and more people are coming to the realities of their inability to properly care for their aged loved ones.

In thinking of the options available to me, especially as a single woman, I can relate to the idea my mother and her friends once toyed with, an idea which appeals to me and enables me to be in control of my life in old age and interestingly, it is not a new concept as it embraces communal living. The reason it appeals to me is that, if I will have to live with other people in old age, I might as well live with people I like and enjoy their company. It is a concept that is already being practiced in some climes and the idea is to jointly procure some form of real estate either a house or a land, renovate or build small apartments units – ideally a bedroom if a house or a two bedroom apartment if land is purchased for each subscriber and share common areas like the dining, sitting room etc amenities and expenses such as water, security etc. Subscribers can draw up agreements as to the rules that will govern the community and the exit plans in case of death and estate issues.

This kind of arrangement will help reduce the burden we may put on our children to care for or to make time for us in our old age, will be less expensive and will help allay the fear of being alone in old age especially if we choose the right persons to live with.

Any takers?

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