Via comment by Anonymous on “The ‘5 ‘L’s’ suggest that senior citizens must au...
Agreed 100%. Just let me die in my bed.
What's wrong with just leaving old folks alone to live out their last days as they wish?
I will slightly, ever so slightly concede the point about driving as older folks are sometimes dangerous to others when they drive but I just don't remember any old folks out shooting randomly at innocent people in the street. No, it's young folks, mostly already felons, who are doing that.
As for family deciding what is best for their parents, there is a bit too much of that as well. Oh mama we don't want you living alone, it's not safe. So they lock mama up in a place she doesn't want to be to endure the rest of her years when all she wants to do is live out her life in her own home. Death is inevitable. If you are in your 90's why would you want and why would your family want to take away your freedom just to extend your life for a few more months?
The truth is, most folks put their parents in some sort of "facility" so they don't have to be bothered with them any more. My mom will be 96 this month. She still lives at home alone. She still drives. Her license was renewed last year and is good until she is 99. She has already limited where and when she drives on her own without me having to tell her to do it. She's earned the right to live out her years as she pleases, where she wants to live. If she tells me it's time for her to move to a facility I'll do what I can to help her. Until then I try to make sure she has what she needs and is safe. If something happens to her at home and she dies there, so be it.
She'll go the way she wants to go and I only pray that I'm allowed the same dignity.
my grandpa drove until his kidney gave out ( he left his other in eastern France) There is a lady down the road in her 80's and she drive fine but likes to speed a little.
ReplyDeleteReminds me of my Great Aunt Lucy.
Delete(Aunt Lucy was a terrible driver. She could not learn how to back, so she finally had the rear of the garage removed so she could pull straight through! When she drove down Mosby Avenue in Littleton, she always stayed precisely in the middle of the road, and everyone would pull over to the side of the road in fear of their life! BT)
http://www.namsouth.com/viewtopic.php?t=245&highlight=aunt+lucy
http://www.namsouth.com/viewtopic.php?t=44&highlight=aunt+lucy
Brock my aunt and uncle and 3 cousins lived in Littleton for many years where they both taught school. My cousin died last week and I was at Thunder Swamp Baptist Church for her funeral on Tuesday. I can almost assure you that they knew your Great Aunt Lucy.
DeleteHow interesting! My mother was born at the house directly across the street from the high school (houseno longer standing) and I have a picture of her doing a handstand in the yard as a teenager and you can see the school in the background.:) The monument at the end of Monument Avenue was erected to my great grandfather. Second picture from the bottom:
Deletehttp://shnvthangs.blogspot.com/2005/09/my-black-north-carolina-kinfolk_17.html
Some more Littleton:
http://www.namsouth.com/viewtopic.php?t=588&highlight=leach
She married a Koonce which is my real name, but changed when my aunt adopted me after my mother died at 28. Strangely enough, my fifth Dixie shares her birthday which was a nice present. My father met my mother when his mother managed the Panacea Springs Hotel which I'm sure you are aware of.
http://www.namsouth.com/viewtopic.php?t=837&highlight=koonce
Where do you live now, if I'm not too inquisitive? Small world!
Brock it was me, Charlie in New Bern, who was the anonymous writer
Deleteof the comment about your aunt in Littleton as well as the main body of this thread. I never went to Littleton more than a few times half a century ago
until last Tuesday. My uncle moved there to teach after college and married a local girl. He died in the 70's and she moved to Roanoke Rapids but has always attended that Bear Swamp Baptist church out there on hwy 48. In fact I think they actually lived closer to Aurelian Springs than Littleton. I've lived all of my life but my college years and a few months here in Craven Co as did my dad.
I see and thanks. Where did he teach?
DeleteFiend Brock,
ReplyDeleteThis is a post that my family can really relate to at this time. Pam's mom age 84 sold her small farm site about 8 years ago and moved to a Seniors gated community in the city of Mt Vernon proper. Her apartment is very nice indeed although I have seen cells in third world countries that were larger.
Pam's mom was about as active a senior as one could hope for prior to moving. She kept the 2 story farm house and barn as well immaculate. She moved the 4 acres the house sat on herself, and went out about 3 nights a week country dancing.
She has been a widow since the early 70's with her husband dying of a heart attack while Pam and he were putting up new fence for the horses. He died only six months after Pam's eldest brother died while on leave from the military, when his car rolled over on him after a blow out ran him into a ditch. 3 other young men walked away without even a scratch. Needless to say the loss was heavy on the entire family.
I think my mother in law threw all her grief into her job at a Drs office, and in keeping up the home place.
I swear she started going down hill the very week she moved to the old folks place. But, it was Pam's older sibling who convinced her it was time to downsize. Pam was totally against it. Since moving, she has had multiple surgeries, and receives weekly treatments for a blood condition. She spends about 3 days on the average going to the Dr. or a hospital. She now finds herself talking about the old home place more and more, and though she would never ever admit it, we are convinced she regrets
leaving.
My mom, also 84 lives in a three bedroom home on 6 acres with my 90 year old step dad. They both still drive, though I wish neither of them would. It's pretty scary, he drives about 35 and momma drives 70 mph or more given the chance.
Momma has several serious health issues, and my step dad has asbestos-is from 50 years as a boiler maker, and he has had more strokes that Carter has liver pills.
Momma wants to sell the place and move to assisted living, and my step dad refuses to budge.
Pam and myself as well as my sister seem to be doing more and more for them with each new week. We certainly are not complaining or wanting to shirk family duties, but, we all have medical issues of our own and none of us are spring chickens anymore.
I apologize for the length of this reply, I think I just needed a sounding board as well as hoping some of your readers had some quality advice or related situations
Hope all is well down there,
from behind enemy lines
T
Thanks and the same think happened to my neighbor who was 92, living alone, driving and doing just fine. Her son and his wife convinced her to come live with them in the mountains and it was all downhill from there. She said his wife wasn't at all pleasant and later on put her into a nursing home and she died not too long afterwards.
Deleteaaaagggghhhhhh :[
ReplyDeleteHoe is your Mom doing?
DeleteMom is doing much better - totally back to normal thankfully. Hopefully she will want to come down here to stay with me for awhile - then we can have the talk about what she really wants to do with the rest of her life - I will do whatever she wants ;)
ReplyDeleteTell her she'll like it better down here. :) Hoe S/B How. :(
DeleteShe does like my cooking a lot better.
DeleteI didn't understand the last part of your message...
Hoe is your Mom doing should be How is your mom doing. :) Of course, I also listed "Monument Avenue" above when it should have been Mosby Avenue. Bad day in Flat Rock. :) Monument Avenue is in Richmond.
DeleteI get it now S/B - should be - didn't know that, but now I do - I grew up in a town just north of Flat Rock, MI - don't worry, everything will be okay once they get us into the Soylent Green rest homes ....
DeleteWhere do you sign up......? :)
Deletethis reminds me of the old Sioux warrior guy in "Little Big Man" who goes out to the burial grounds and lies down to die...but he doesn't die.... he waits but he is still alive.... why am I still alive??? he asks.... no answer, so he gets up and goes back to the village.
ReplyDeleteyikes
I remember that and it was cute. :)
DeleteI've given up any hope of dying peacefully in my bed. How can anyone, but those already there, feel any different?
ReplyDeleteMiracles do happen and we will certainly need one.
DeleteAmerica is one of the few countries in the world where we dont take care of our elderly family members. I have a customer that just turned 97 and her daughters are always trying to get her to go to a nursing home even though she is as healthy as most 40 year olds. Both of my folks are gone now but my wifes grandparents are 92 and 95 years old. We will do whatever keeps them at home where they are happy. Our parents gave us life the least we can do is help them enjoy the last years of their lives. Best wishes to you snd your mom.
ReplyDeleteEncouraging. Thanks.
Delete