We have a duty to our elders to be taken care of with dignity
Government and society must step up and support
MEMORIES of a remarkable French film Amour came flooding back to me recently when I read the sad story of 64-year-old Dickson Naidoo, who confessed to killing his bedridden wife because he was unable to take care of her any longer.
He described her as a large woman and said he had been struggling to pick her up or give her a bath. According to reports, he claimed to have bathed and fed her but because she was a largish woman he was experiencing great difficulty in his frail state and could no longer perform the duties.
He said he had no additional support and was left to care for her on his own. He was fed up, a source had said.
Of significance in such matters, is the choice of method that is used to perform this act of ending the life of a loved one.
First, he attempted to suffocate her with a pillow. When that failed, he fetched a large kitchen knife and slit her throat.
Of concern here is the lack of institutional support when the man cried out for help. Where were the social workers? Why was he not rescued? Is he a patient or a criminal in this act, a victim or an abuser?
In a parallel situation in the film Amour, an elderly French bourgeois couple are retired music teachers living in a Parisian apartment.
Their daughter, Eva, is a musician. She is on tour in Europe. One day, Anne has a stroke that paralyses her right side, and Georges nurses his wife and promises to send her neither to a hospital nor to a nursing home. Soon Anne’s life deteriorates and her mental and physical capabilities decline fast, leading Georges to take a tragic decision. He suffocates her with a pillow, lays flowers over her head and leaves.
In both cases – one real, the other fiction – the extent of the personal trauma is palpable. As observers, we are drawn deeply into the heartbreaking tragedy that leaves us emotionally torn.
Why does it have this impact on us? Because we are forced to look into the future from which one cannot escape. In reality, getting old brings in its wake heartbreaking moments for the elderly.
Ageing is inevitable but the combination of disability, poverty and limited resources bear heavily on families. What both these cases highlight is the devastating impact of burnout for the sole carers.
Longevity without ailments is bad enough, but longevity with ailments is viewed as a curse to many families who are relegated the task of having to take care of ageing parents or spouses.
Viewed at best as a mild irritation, a nuisance, an encumbrance, the continuum of treatment may range to traumatisation and abandonment leading ultimately to murder or suicide.
We may not realise this now, but a population ageing is set to become one of the most consequential social alterations in the age of humankind.
Improvements in the overall quality of life and medical advances have helped older people to live longer, but society is unprepared for this major change in lifestyle.
I heard a woman flippantly respond to a question about her ageing in-laws in a rather humorous manner: “Two down, one more to go”.
With the rise in dual-income families, societal values have undergone dramatic changes. Through no fault of theirs, working couples have no time or space for the older parents. Geographical mobility has scattered children to far off countries thus minimising the pool of responsibility to fewer siblings. The older population either suffers from harsh treatment on the part of their children or they are forced to live the rest of their days under abject emotional and financial poverty.
Apart from these broader issues, we cannot ignore the ugly experiences older people have to go through as they age. It is hard to imagine how they face physical and emotional neglect, abuse, and violence when their bodies are about to give up at any point in time.
An ageing population is no longer a ponderous issue just for the government – each one of us is impacted by it either directly or indirectly. But are we ready for the so-called sandwich generations? As longevity increases, the pressure gets greater on ageing children to have the added responsibility of taking care of three generations and to face the added burden of becoming a parent to an ageing parent. I speak from experience here as I am responsible for providing emotional, social and physical comfort to my mother, who will turn 104 this year.
At this phase in their lives, the elderly are in search of a home. They want to go home. But where is this home they yearn for? Invariably it is the home of their childhood where they felt safe and loved bringing forth feelings of being in the womb. It is certainly not about a place, rather it is about a feeling. Over prolonged periods of caring for the elderly, there is a heavy toll on the spouse as a caregiver.
How do they cope and what should we be looking out for to prevent the horrific situation in the two cases cited above.
Caregiver burnout is a state of emotional, mental, and physical exhaustion caused by the prolonged and overwhelming stress of care-giving.
Common symptoms of compassion fatigue include chronic physical and emotional exhaustion, weeping, depersonalisation, irritability, feelings of self-contempt, difficulty sleeping, weight loss, headaches.
Over time one may begin to notice the gradual lessening of compassion caused by the emotional and physical burden created by the trauma of helping others and listening to their traumatic and difficult circumstances. Who cares for the carer?
If governments ignore the needs of the aged in a society undergoing vast changes, they do so at their moral peril.
We have a duty to our elders to be taken care of with dignity. House visits by social workers, good institutional facilities for those who cannot afford private facilities and generous grants to ensure a good and comfortable life.
Dickson Naidoo should be rescued, not punished, for a crime that was really society’s responsibility.