p. 670 | CARE FOR THE AGED by Mrs. N. M. Coon.

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Oct 15, 1901

CARE FOR THE AGED.

By Mrs. N. M. Coon.

MRS. N. M. COON. (Battle Creek, Mich.)

In God’s word we read, “Be patient toward all men.” “We ought also to love one another.” “Be pitiful, be courteous.” In still farther reading we see that these words were addressed especially to God’s people, which implies that they may fall short in this respect. We cannot think of any condition in life in which love and patience are not needed. This is especially true of the young and of the aged. The inexperience of youth and the decrepitude of age are a direct appeal for our sympathies and love. Yet the young have a pre-eminence over the aged. The sprightliness of the opening intellect, the beauty of form and feature, the innocence of the little one, recommend it to our favor. With the aged it is not so. Time has changed the features. The once fair face is seamed with care and sorrow. The eyes have lost their luster. The ears are not so quick to hear. The step is feeble, and the hands unsteady. Even the voice is changed. Change is written on all that pertains to the aged.

The aged tell again and again the same story of events that occurred in their youth and in more mature years, in days before the duties of life were laid aside for younger hands. The present is lived as an infant lives, making an impression for the moment only, to be soon forgotten. The mind goes back to childhood. Those pictures are retained in the memory. Sometimes you will see a smile flit across the aged face as some pleasing remembrance is recalled, again the silent tear, as he reviews the past, or sees some loved one slowly borne to the last resting place.

“Be courteous,” yes, even to the aged. How often we hear people say, “Oh, it’s only old man, or old woman, So-and-so,” as if age made people dishonorable. How often we hear the laugh go round at the expense of the aged because of some grammatical error of speech or some misunderstanding caused by their deafness. One might think by the treatment they receive that they had lost their feelings. But the poet tells us that “hearts grow strangely sensitive when age has dimmed the sight.”

Frequently an aged father or mother is given a home with a child. They are well fed and clothed. They are given the cosiest corner, and it is felt that the entire duty to them has been done. But it can almost be said of them, as of the dead, “Neither have they any more a portion forever in anything that is done under the sun.” They cannot hear readily, and no pains is taken to tell them the news. “Why should they know? They are just as well off not to know.”

Watch the aged as an exclamation of amazement from some member of the family reaches the dull hearing, and see the anxiety shown to know what has called it forth. Perhaps all are too busy to hear the feeble request to know, and it is soon forgotten. Sometimes they will make some suggestion or venture to give advice, and are told that they are like a last-year’s almanac, “out of date.”

This is a dark picture, but there are some happy exceptions where those who have become helpless are treated with a tenderness that is almost reverential. They are not left to pass hours alone, are informed of the pleasant happenings of the day, often a scrap of interesting news from a paper, or a verse that has comfort in it, is placed in their hands. Sometimes a few flowers are brought for their admiration. The first ripe berries find their way to the afflicted one. A caressing hand smoothes back the hair from the careworn face, the collar is adjusted, a word of affection is given. How small all this looks on paper, but these little attentions are of importance to the aged, and help them to live their last days, not merely endure them.

A little girl once met an aged man on the street. Her quick eye saw in his sad, patient face that he was not happy, and she gave him a stick of candy. In speaking of it she said, “I think he is some little girl’s grandpa and is lonesome, and maybe the candy will help him to forget to be lonesome.” This little act of kindness was like a bright sunbeam in a dark day to the aged man, and he was never tired of speaking of it. He was past ninety years of age, had been a Baptist minister, and by circumstances that he had no control over had become separated from his children and placed in a charitable institution, and in his helplessness grieved for them. This little act of kindness by the child was the first of a number of trifling attentions that were as stepping-stones to at last restore him to the care of those he so much loved.

In the same institution was an old lady of eighty-three. A friend visiting her one day found her asleep in her rocker. She gently patted her on the cheek, when the sleeper, without stirring, said, “Mother, yes, mother, I’ll get up; yes, I’ll get up soon.” She was a child again. In her dream her mother was awakening her as in her childhood so long ago. She opened her eyes and saw her friend in the place of her mother, and realizing it was all a dream, she closed them again, saying, “O dear, O dear!” Then looking up, she said, “Do you know I am a baby? Yes, I am.” “How is that?” the visitor queried. “Well, I was the youngest of a large family. There were thirteen of us children, but they are all gone,—father, mother, brothers, and sisters, all gone! O dear! Yes, I am just a baby again. I cannot do anything, and there is no one left to care for me.” She soon regained her cheerfulness, and the remainder of the visit was spent in pleasant converse. “How did she

come to be here?” do you ask? Not because she was poor, but because of the avarice of a distant relative.

Another dear old lady past eighty, who had evidently been a woman of ability, intelligence, and culture, her children holding responsible positions in society, was placed here by a son. She said she had a beautiful granddaughter who had tired of seeing her around. She was perfectly crushed by being separated from her children, yet tried to make it appear as well for them as she could. A few months after coming to the institution her mind became so deranged by brooding over her trouble that she disarranged everything in her room, undressed, and wrapped herself in a sheet, and walked up and down in the hall in her misery, mourning for her children.

A lady in the West who had had her mother with her nearly all her married life, the mother having been like a servant to her in her home till old age crept on, and she became helpless, turned her over to strangers to care for. She had no time for that aged mother who had been such a willing slave to her all those years. This woman is one of those who are proclaiming that the Lord is soon coming again. Have we not reached the time foretold when self-love shall predominate and natural affection be wanting?

Probably there are hundreds who read the dear old REVIEW who have parents or other relatives who need their care. Don’t shirk your duty and crush the hearts of those already afflicted, and plant thorns for your pillow.

Charitable institutions are all right, and it would be better if there were more in the land; but such places are for those who have outlived all who should take care of them; those from whom misfortune has swept all away, leaving them destitute and helpless. No institution, however well equipped, having the most thoughtful and sympathizing matrons and trained nurses to care for its inmates, can take the place of children or near relatives in the care of the helpless aged.

You may say it calls for so much self-denial. Pleasure, ease, society, must be given up. In extreme cases even religious privileges must be foregone. It requires much patience, hard work, and many sleepless nights. Excuse me for speaking of myself. The trial once came to me, and I drank the cup to the bitter dregs. How well I did my duty God alone knows, but I can say that I have no thorns in my pillow.

If we could just look into the future and see ourselves old and stricken, in the easy-chair, and others caring for us, would it not make us more thoughtful for those who need our attention?

God’s word tells us that “we all do fade as a leaf.” All, not some. How differently the leaves fade as the frost of autumn touches them. Some grow bright and delicate,—reminding us of real Christians who, although they grow old, have a charm about them that is sweet and tender,—while other leaves are dark and blotched and crisp as soon as the chilling frost touches them. These remind us of those who have been made sour and bitter in disposition by the cares and disappointments of life. Such have no hope. These need love and patience to tide them over, and perhaps win them back to the love of our Heavenly Father.