Discussing aging and death in a society that doesn't want to age or die
When I told friends, family, coworkers that I was writing a feature about aging (not the cosmetic kind we so often trouble ourselves with, but the inevitable decline of mind and body that we all will face should we live long enough) I was usually met with a personal story. Grandpa had a bad fall but still wants to live alone, or we moved Grandma into a dreary assisted living home, even though we didn’t want to. Pretty much everyone has a story. In a family system, the end-of-life experience is a shared one.
But perspectives within the family are vastly different. It was Susan Bragstad, the 89-year-old olive farmer and city councilmember I interviewed for this story, who told me that the end-of-life season can be harder for the family. We have a primordial roadmap for old age and dying — a sort of biological preset that gets switched on and carries us through, along with best palliative practices. If something like that exists for those watching a loved one slip away, I don’t think our individualistic society engenders it. In researching this story, I learned that there is a deep well of collective trauma simmering just below the surface, yet we rarely talk about it. Why? I think it's because we like to forget about aging and death whenever we can.
For the caretakers I interviewed, it was their first time sharing their experience from beginning to end. There was anger, tears, catharsis. Their hardship was compounded by a lack of preparedness, feelings of isolation and overwhelming expenses. I believe that senior care is one of the biggest issues we face as an aging population, but it remains a quiet epidemic of private suffering. If you’re going through this with a loved one, ask for help. Broadcast your struggles. And when it’s over, though all you want to do is move on with your life and forget — don’t, because your child will be next.
You can read the story here.
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