Saying No to Nursing Homes

There's something else to how Mom and I got to where we are today. Namely, experiences and conversations we had about 40-45 years ago.

What happened was this. When I was about 16 or 17, my aunt (my mother's sister), after a difficult deliberations I knew nothing about at t the time, decided to place her father (and my mother's father) in a nursing home. This man, my maternal grandfather, had always been an independent, tough-minded carpenter who all his life had hunted and fished on his own. He had become older and lost his ability to function as well as he had in the past in a number of areas, though.

I was present when my aunt ... with Mom's concurrence at the time ... drove my grandfather to a nursing home. Before leaving, this proud, independent man literally begged me, with tears in his eyes, "Don't leave me here." I was very upset, but didn't know what if anything I could do. We left him there; and within months he had died. His death ... alone and abandoned as I then understood it to be; and still understand it to have been ... had an enormous impact on me. I talked about it with Mom; I read; I thought; I prayed; and finally came to the conclusion that I would never willingly be a party to forcing anyone into a nursing home ever again.

Several things I read in my early college years especially seemed to compel me to this conclusion. Plato's Republic in particular might seem like an unlikely source of counsel on this subject: but I was very impressed by the early dialog with old Glaucon, about how people deal with old age. Basically Glaucon and his companions made what seemed to me then, and seems to me know, very common-sense observations: that we do the best we can do as we age; we cope as best we can; and our attitude toward our gradual loss of function and ability in old age probably mostly mirrors our attitudes toward life in general as young and middle-aged adults.

Later I read The Aeneid, and was impressed by Aeneas' carrying of his aged father, Anchises, on his shoulder as they fled their home in doomed, flaming Troy. I guess a more calculating advisor to Aeneas might have said something like, "Look, Dude, you've got the Roman Empire to found; that old guy is doomed anyway, and hasn't got anything to bring with him out of Troy anyway; why not just move on, he's excess baggage, right?" Yet Aeneas, the Man of Destiny, didn't think Destiny should come before his filial devotion to Anchises.

Reading the Gospels, I was impressed by Christ's special love for anyone, it seemed, who seemed to be lacking in any way whatsoever. And later yet, as a Catholic convert, I was deeply impressed by the Church's commitment to upholding the Dignity of the Human Person, no matter what the person's physical or mental condition.

So during some conversations with Mom, we evolved an understanding that if and when the time came, I'd do whatever I could to return to her, in some small measure, what she gave to me as a caregiver.

This is not to say that there might not be circumstances under which a nursing home might still become necessary. However, I feel very, very strongly that an NH should only be a very last resort, for us, at least; and this is, I know from ongoing conversations with Mom, is her understanding as well. I honor her right to decide on her own path in these matters; and have told her again and again that I will, as best I can, support her in her choices in this regard. This I view as a promise to her; a promise I naturally want to keep.

To finish up a bit on the rest of our family: I have a sister, who lives a few states away from where I and my Mom live, in the Southwest USA. My Dad died years ago, of Alzheimer's Disease. And yes: this means that I am at risk for Alzheimer's. So, for that matter, is my Mom, but that's another story.