A very interesting article by Charles Oputa boy aka Charly Boy. Read below...
Life as we all know evolves in stages. From birth, we begin the process of aging. All things being equal, majority of us will grow old. Thus it will be apt to say that aging is inevitable for us. So why do we as a society pay the least attention to this process. What kinda welfare system should we have in order to adequately take care of our aged, (The old people in our society/parents or relatives) especially the ones we love.
For three years before my
father passed, he was never paid his pension. My mum is going through
the same thing. I keep wondering, what if the financial or emotional
means to take care of them was lacking, they probably will be like some
of our aged pensioners who probably die standing in line waiting for
their pension that never came.
I am of the
opinion we are not doing enough as a society. It is deplorable that so
many people work and expend all their energy and when they become old,
there's no one to really take care of them. In one episode of my radio
show (Talk Junction), we talked about the need for parents to ensure
that they bond with their children because we believe that children who
have a close bond with their parents are the ones most likely to take
charge and care of them in their old age. That's the way society is
meant to evolve. we as children should be the ones to look after our
parents, yes it is the African way. They slaved and spent all their
lives looking after us so it is expected that we in return should take
care of them. My parents lived with me for several years after their
retirement. My widowed mum is 97 years old and I can't imagine her
living anywhere else but with me. Being the primary caregiver and living
again under the same roof with your parents is an enormous role
reversal.
Most of us living with
aged parents find it difficult to balance our own busy schedules with
looking after an aged parent so much so that sometimes it could be
misconstrued as not caring. For some, it could be that the global
financial mess, has left us thinking about self and our survival only.
But this piece is about those who can but don't want to. I am of the
opinion that not just government but also the corporate bodies need to
focus more on developing policies that protect this age bracket. In more
developed society it is very easy to see a nursing home systems that
caters to the old people but how effective can that be in our country.
This is a place where most pensioners can't even get access to their
pension after retirement. Corruption has eaten so deep into our various
systems that even the basic are not provided by the system. For
me nursing homes are so impersonal and that is not our culture in
Africa.
For people like us who don't have the
benefits of earning any pension, we are on our own. God forbid that in
our old age we become either a liability to our children or worse still,
a liability to ourselves. We have all seen the antecedents of
government towards the aged and until a miracle happens, I'm not sure
that will change anytime soon. I have never worked for anyone so what
I've done is that through all the years, I have consistently put aside a
monthly savings in a fixed account on regular basis which I haven't
touched for over 30 years despite sometimes my financial hardship.
Planing, saving and discipline is the key to making the twilight years
of our lives easier.
A lot of people wake up to
the reality that after years of service, they don't have much to show
for it and that can lead to bitterness in old age. My summary on this
will be to advice all of us to learn to cultivate the habit of saving
for this phase of our life's. We must imbibe the attitude of saving for
the rainy day and our old age is the rainy day.
One day,
we as parents won't be able to drive, to climb stairs, or maybe even
change our own clothes or feed ourselves. As painful as thinking about
this might be, we need to prepare for our comfort and safety in the last
stages of our lives. My prayer for us parents is to have children who
will keep us company in our old age maybe take care of us with love and
anything else. Ka chineke mezieokwu.
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