As we attempt to protect our elderly population in this pandemic, this is what I see when I look through the window,
I look into the window as she awakens to the sound of business outside the door. I can tell that she is not sure who is outside her door. For that matter not sure of the day or time. Is it Wednesday, or Saturday. They all seem the same, day after day unchanging. Someone enters her room with very little conversation. No small talk, places her breakfast box on the tiny table by her chair. I see her say hello and smile at the woman, she just turns to leave. She slowly opens the Styrofoam box to find watery eggs and sausage and a cup of coffee. Her neuropathy won’t allow her to open the sugar that she would love to have added to her coffee, but the woman is already gone. She tries to open it but finally puts it down and she just drinks it black. I watch her struggle to eat a few bites of the eggs, dropping them on her shirt. I think she finally figured it is morning. I see she has her TV on, but I know she can’t hear much of the show as she is hearing impaired. I notice it has the closed caption on again. I guess she was trying to change the channel. She just can’t use that remote and I can’t get in to change it myself. She just sits listlessly staring ahead. Loneliness. Is what I see!
I knock on her window to get her attention. She finally looks up. She smiles, it makes me sad to see her happy just to see me through the window, but it is all I can do. Her hair is so disheveled. She would have never looked like this. She always had a standing appointment at the beauty shop weekly for a wash and style. But I guess it doesn’t matter, she doesn’t ever see her hair. She goes nowhere, only sitting in her room. Alone. I wave at her smiling, while fighting back tears. I hold up my phone to motion that I am going to call her room. I can hear it ringing. I watch her slowly reach for the phone. It continues to ring. Again her neuropathy slows her so much my call is forwarded to voice mail. I call back but now get an instant message. She has not ended the previous call. I finally call the facility and ask someone to please go to her room and help her answer the phone. She smiles as she hears my voice. Why can’t these phones be like they used to be? Why can’t I just answer it when someone calls me so I can talk to them? Can you please find me a phone like I used to have? Why do I have to push buttons? I can’t remember which buttons to push. I just can’t use this phone.
Another person with face covered, enters the room, hands her some pills and a sip of water. They are quickly gone. Alone again. She asks if I can just come in for a minute, she has something she wants to tell me. I try to explain that I can’t come in at all. I would love to, but I am not allowed. I can only watch from outside the window. She tries to tell me something about last night, but her story is hard to follow. She was never like this, always so lucid with organized thought. This is all changing as I watch from outside the window. She again asks if I can get an appointment to see her. I feel like she thinks she is forgotten; the loneliness is overwhelming. She cannot understand why I don’t visit.
I see her plant in the window sill, it needs watering. I tell her the plant needs a drink. But I know she can’t water it and the people here are too busy she says. We talk about her breakfast, and I tell her I brought her a few goodies they will deliver to her room. She smiles. I finally tell her that I’m leaving as it is cold outside. The smile fades and she says again “can you come in for just a minute?”
This is what I see from the window! This is one visit at her long term care facility. These visits are increasingly painful to watch and be a part of. The longer she is kept from her family, the worse she gets cognitively and physically. I see the sadness. I see the decline in her health through this window. I know there are others seeing the same as they look through their loved one’s windows. The only thing these precious people have done wrong is get old. Now they are forced to live out their last days all alone. I understand we are trying to protect the frail and elderly, but is that really what we are doing?
Teresa Peers
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Amen to Teresa Peers! You are not alone in this fight. I know all the facilities are doing their best to keep people safe, but at what cost?
I think many would choose to “take a chance” on the virus versus the isolation.
From one caregiver to another, I hear you.
Jeannie Hixon