The Aging Process

It was my first to attend a home for the sick and aged. Honestly, I was a bit scared at first because I didn't know what to expect. I'm not into old people (I sound so discriminatory). That fact makes me feel such a selfish person. Perhaps it's the unconscious fear in me of getting old and being alone.

Sadness - the first feeling I had seeing so many aunties and uncles sitting side by side on their wheelchairs. Some cannot speak or even see anymore. Some are bedridden with tubes inside their noses. Some who are curled up with pain reflected on their faces. Some who just stare off into space and mumble to themselves.

It was lunch time when we started walking around the place. I remember feeling incapable of helping. But I knew how to take care of kids and you know how sometimes when people grow old, it's a reversed process and they're now back to being a kid again.

It was this instance when I just started saying hi, waving at them and talking with them. I helped feed one auntie with her lunch just like I would a baby. It felt awkward at first but I realized I know what to do. I just instinctively wanted to help her. I wasn't waiting for her to recognize my good deed as she was unable to speak at all. She just nodded or shook her head at me. I couldn't explain why I still felt helpless even though I was already helping. It just feels like it's not enough. Is that it? Just feed them and then what they're back to wallowing in depression and pain? I don't know what to do.

There was also this Malay uncle who spoke to me that we are doing such a good thing. He told me jokingly that he's on his way home. At first, I though he was going home to his family and such but he pointed upwards saying "I'm going up there". He was telling me in his own way that he's passing soon. He was laughing like it was a joke which I couldn't quite swallow. He then told me a bit of his life story in bits and pieces. It was difficult for him to speak in English but I tried my best to understand and nodded at his words.

There were times when my selfishness kicks in. I tell RA that I do not want to grow old and be like them - pained, depressed and alone. But I should understand that life is a cycle and I would eventually reach this point in my life. I'm not quite so scared coz I have this feeling of security - which is my family. I know people have different points of view. But I still believe families should always be together through thick and thin, through sickness and in health, through all the years. It sounds like the first few phrases of a marriage vows but the truth is, this applies to every good relationship. I pray for each one of us to have this kind of relationship.

I want to visit them again and bring a bit of joy in their lives one smile at a time. It makes a whole of difference to them to have someone to talk to, to see another person who would listen and just plain be there for them. Here's the website link of the place we went to:

http://www.sreenarayanamission.org/

Some Images:



Question for the day: Do you care as much as you think you do?