Recently due to something I’ve been doing, I have had a lot of interaction with the elderly. The majority of them are age 75 and over. Almost all of them live alone and some of them have caretakers that come during the day to assist them in tasks like bathing, etc. A majority of them have children living in the U.S. and most of them are Caucasian, of European decent.
Now these elderly individuals often want to talk to me for a little amount of time, about their lives or their family. It’s not something I ask them, but they just seem to like to share that with me, and I figure I may learn something from them so I just listen.
The theme that I find so overwhelming with a majority of them is that they don’t like living without their family members. They don’t enjoy living alone. Some of them live in a senior citizen community and they have their own apartments with nice amenities. Some just live in homes in the suburbs.
I recall visiting this one lady very vivdly. I was talking to her and she started speaking about her daughter who lives in another state with her wealthy husband. There was one complaint after the other about how her daughter refuses to even have her mother live in the same city with her. I don’t know the reasons but it was terribly sad. It’s true I don’t know both sides of the story, but it was just heart wrenching to see this 80 year old woman almost cry about the fact that she lives alone and has nobody to care for her. Apparently her daughters husband doesn’t like the idea of her living close-by. She kept asking me, “Who is going to know if I drop dead?” It was just awful to listen to that.
Then there was another lady who lived by herself and her brother lived in a nearby city. This lady was really sick and lived by herself. She complained right infront of me and her brother that he rarely visits her and therefore doesn’t seem to care about his only sister, and wouldnt care if she died the next day. I kept quiet. She complained quite a bit and I was thinking to myself that perhaps her brother may not have the patience to deal with that. I have found that some people just cant be around such individuals, because it interferes with their “functioning”. But do you leave a sister by herself, living so far away? Again I said to myself that I don’t know the whole story so I couldn’t comment. It also reminded me of the many times my parents have told me that if I don’t get married, I shouldn’t rely completely on my siblings to always be there for everything.
There was an elderly lady who lives by herself and her daughter lives about 30 minutes from her. She had fallen sick one day and her daughter didn’t come to visit. She told me she was very disappointed at this. I asked her why she doesn’t live with her daughter, she said because her daughter has a cat and she doesn’t like to be around cats.
Finally, there was this lady who lived by herself in this gorgeous condo on the beach. It had all these amenities. Her daughter and son lived in the same city, but about 40 minutes away. I don’t know what came over me, but I asked her if she was happy. She flatly said no. I asked her if she enjoyed all the amenities the place had to offer, she said not really when you don’t have anyone with you. She told me she’d rather live with her children, but they preferred to live by themselves.
It just seems like so many of these individuals are just waiting for life to pass. It’s so horribly sad. I just cant get over the fact that they have family and yet family cant or wont have them live with them. I do understand some people have supposedly very good reasons, but it just makes you think. When I was a teenager my parents knew that I didn’t want them to live with them no matter what. Thank Allah that since then I have completely changed my views. I have had to build a better relationship with them, and Alhumdulillah have been able to do so. Now I cant imagine the thought of not living with my parents, something just two years ago I didn’t even want to do.
Interacting with the elderly has really reinforced the fact that I would never want my parents to live without a family member with them. I think more people should visit the elderly or interact with them, and really take a look at their perspective on things. Perhaps you may not agree with their thinking (or mine) but I am pretty sure it will have an affect on you.
Many of the elderly people I come across often tell something along the lines of “ If you care for your parents, please don’t ever let them live on their own.”