An unpredictable life

It was New Year’s Eve at the small senior’s community where my mother and father lived in Nanaimo. The elderly woman who lived alone in Unit 104 was late for their annual celebration. Elsa* had promised to be there and her no show was concerning. “She’s been feeling blue lately,” my mother told the other residents. “I’d best go check on her and make sure she’s okay.”

My mother went to the door of Unit 104 and rang the doorbell. No answer. She rang again. She and Elsa had exchanged keys some time before ‘just in case’. Nervous, but thinking this was a ‘just in case’ that warranted her using the key, my mother put the key in the lock and opened the door.

She found her friend in the kitchen. She was lying on the floor in a pool of blood. She had taken her own life.

My mother was devastated. After the police and emergency vehicles left, after a counselor had told her repeatedly there was nothing she could have done, my mother still harboured the secret belief everyone was wrong. There must have been something she could have done to prevent her friend’s final act.

In time, her grief abated until a few months later when my father, her husband of 52 years, had a massive heart attack and crossed over to the ‘other side’. Immediately, memories of her friend’s death invaded. Elsa too had lost her husband. Elsa too felt lost and alone.

Would her life end the same my mother wondered? Would she resort to ending it all because loneliness and despair eroded her sense of well-being?

Fearful. Worried, she asked, “How will I ever cope on my own?” “How will I survive?”

“One day at a time,” my sisters and I told her. “You could not have stopped Elsa’s death, just as you could not have stopped dad’s heart attack. You must live, one day at a time.

For twelve years after my father passed away, my mother continued to live on her own, until one day, a bad fall when she was eighty-five ended her independence. She was sad. Upset. Frightened. How will she cope without her independence? How will she get along within a community of strangers sharing the common term ‘senior’?

For two years now my mother has lived in an assisted living complex. She has her own room complete with TV, computer (she’s an email whizkid), kettle and small fridge. Her meals are shared in the cafeteria. Her daily routine focused around card games, day trips and group activities designed to keep her active, engaged and thriving in her golden years.

She still misses her own apartment, especially her kitchen. She still regrets the loss of independence. But what she doesn’t miss out on is friendship. She has a community at her new living space. A community that looks out for each other. That ensures no one is missed and if they are, someone always checks up on them.

At the DI, we have seniors who cannot afford a place of their own. Often, their needs do not fit the scope and level of care of other agencies. They might have an addiction or mental health issue that makes them unsuitable to be housed elsewhere. Often, we become the agency of last resort, the place they didn’t want to go to that turns out to be the one place they can go to find some dignity and respect in their golden years. It’s a safer environment than the streets. A more welcoming place. It’s a community of people who care for them, in whatever state they’re in. A place that doesn’t judge them on what they wear or how they speak. A place where they find acceptance. It’s a place where they find dignity without losing their self-respect.

One such senior is a man whom I’ll call, Bruce. Bruce had an addiction that was compounded by Type II Diabetes. He was subject to seizures. No one could predict when they might happen. No one could stop their onslaught.

One day Bruce suffered a seizure in the confined space of a washroom. Locked in the grip of a paralyzing rigidity, he fell to the floor. Staff heard him fall and dashed to his aid. EMS was called and when they arrived, they brought with them a ‘ride-along’. An individual from another agency seeking to gain insight into homelessness by shadowing emergency teams on their rounds.

When the individual encountered the scene in the washroom they were appalled. How could this happen?

“There was feces on the walls and floor,” the ‘ride-along’ cried. “It was so wrong. No one should have to suffer the indignity of having a seizure in a homeless shelter washroom?”

Years ago, my mother walked in on a woman who willfully ended her life in the security of her own home. No one was there to stop her. No one was able to prevent her fall.

People have seizures. No one can predict where the seizure will unfold. On the floor of a homeless shelter. In the comfort of your own home. In a public place.

Seizures are not about loss of dignity unless those in attendance judge the situation undignified. Seizures are not statements of the inappropriateness or ‘badness’ of homelessness. Seizures do not pick and choose their demographic. They’re non-discriminatory. They are a medical condition which target those who are housed and those who are un-housed.

No matter where and when the seizure hits, the person under their thrall needs care and attention appropriate to their situation. They need to be treated with dignity and respect, no matter how undignified the circumstances of their situation.

Connecting dots from a seizure in a homeless shelter to the belief that no one should ever endure such indignity in their lives, raises the question about what needs to change? Is it our perception of the indignity of homelessness? The wrongness of shelters? Or the inability of the medical community to find a cure that stops, once and for all, anyone ever experiencing a seizure where ever they are in the world.

The question isn’t whether or not having a seizure in a shelter is undignified. Are we willing to treat people with dignity no matter where unfortunate circumstances unfold in their lives.
And that’s what we do at the DI. No matter their circumstances. No matter their condition, under the influence, mentally challenged or suffering a seizure, we treat people with dignity and respect. Even when their seizure hits in a washroom stall.

We treat people with respect because of who they are, fellow human beings sharing this human condition. Are you willing to do the same for your fellow man?