I have been in a few nursing homes, either visiting someone, or once I had a job offer (activity director). At the last one I was appalled at the place, and I didn’t take the job because I just couldn’t see myself going there daily (I went back to school instead and got a teaching certificate). At any rate, that particular nursing home was shut down about a year later for violations of all sorts.
But, you know I really do need to find something I can do to go into nursing homes and visit people. I live out here where there are likely a million of them, and I suspect for many of the people who live there, just having someone come in and visit/talk is a bright spot in their day.
I have a friend who is caring for her mother at home, but I go visit her and the other day we took her out to lunch (she’s mobile with a walker). I love her mom, she’s fun and she’s in her 90s so she tells the most interesting things!
I think offering to help, like I wrote in #76, is the best therapy and has useful outcomes.
PS - don’t misinterpret my posts as disliking nursing homes. I feel for the residents.
They are a necessary institution given today’s smaller families and disintegration of the family.
If we could root out the slovenly, the inattentive, the abusive, all would be almost well.
;)
Everyone should contact their local nursing home and get in touch with the volunteer coordinator. There is always something each of us can do.
In our family, we always look after our own, no matter how rough it gets, and I don't want to go into detail but I remember some very rough cases. I'm looking after an elderly relative now, here at home, and homeschooling a younger one who is not my offspring. Given these responsibilities I'll probably never marry and have children, but at least I can live with myself.
Never trust your family to the mercy of strangers. Lions have more mercy than your average human.