Aging: we need to educate future generations
My name is Salim Pabani. I am a retired psychiatric nurse who has recently moved to Lake Cowichan. I have found the people here to be friendly and I’m beginning to feel more settled in the last year and half that I have lived here.
I was deeply saddened to read a letter written by Doreen Peter in your editorial of Citizen last week. I am writing this letter with the hope that my letter will provoke a public response and draw attention to the way we not only disrespect and abuse the marginalised and disadvantaged population in our community but also how we behave at times with each other.
Incontinence is fairly common in old age and brings with it a lot of emotional pain, social embarrassment and grief to whoever is unfortunate enough to become a victim of such an undesirable condition to say the least. Most of the episodes of incontinence occur in situations in which it is well managed by wearing pads etc. to keep the incontinence in check. However, occasionally accidents will happen and an embarrassing situation can arise when incontinence can occur in a public environment like it did in the letter written by Doreen Peter.
I want to commend Doreen for the stance and action she took when two immature and idiotic youngsters laughed at the old gentlemen who experienced an untimely episode of incontinence, in Cowichan District Hospital on Friday, Aug. 25 at around 12 p.m. We as a society can bury our heads in shame if we let this unfortunate incident pass without addressing it to great length. What I mean by this is that we need to think about ways to educate our future generation about what can happen to our minds, our body functions, our self esteem and our dignity to name a few, as we age. In addition we also need to make greater efforts at home, in schools, in our houses of prayer and social media to teach the younger generation, to empathise with people in our community who are disadvantaged, marginalized and compromised in more ways than we can mention here. Not everyone is born with a silver spoon.
Doreen Peter should have had more support than she received. By not taking a definite stance against abusive behaviour to that senior citizen we indirectly support the negative and appalling behavior by those young idiots. I highly applaud the action taken by Doreen. We need more Doreens in our society, otherwise our humanity, as we know it, will become extinct more rapidly than it is at the present time and we will have nobody else to blame but ourselves. What a sad day it will be for humanity. I rest my case here but anyone who cares to discuss this further can write to this editorial or to me at: pabanis_101@hotmail.com.
I invite comments to this letter. Do not let this matter rest here. It’s time to rise to a new challenge.
Salim Pabani
Lake Cowichan