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The corpse under the kitchen table
By adamg on Fri, 01/13/2017 - 12:05pm
WBUR's Carey Goldberg goes beyond the macabre news of the elderly Brookline woman and her sister's body:
Such extreme isolation may have been a symptom of a brain disorder - we don't know. What is clear: If you're so cut off from the world that you can't reach out for help in crisis, isolation can kill.
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Comments
Oh, please! You try living
Oh, please! You try living on a fixed income and see how much you want to go out. Wasn't family checking on them?
Neighbors can only do so much, out of respect for privacy. It sounds like they tried to get them help. This is sad, but, it goes on more than you think. t
They may not have had family to check on them
Sadly, not everyone has family.
This is more common among the elderly than you might think. People who don't have children or living siblings.
The local news channels
The local news channels reported that it was family that discovered the body when they made a visit in December, they came to check because something was wrong with the heat?
Remember this one? http:/
Remember this one? http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1382937/Yvette-Vickers-Ex-Playbo...
The mummified remains of the actress who played the femme fatale in Attack Of The 50 Foot Woman has been found in her rundown Beverly Hills home.
The state of the body indicates Yvette Vickers, 82, who was once a Playboy centrefold may have lain there for a year.
The badly decomposed corpse was discovered at the Californian home where Vickers had lived for decades.
Living on a fixed income doesn't mean isolation
I have family that live on Social Security alone. They get out for walks. They join church social groups. They spend time at the senior center. They visit other seniors. They go to the museum on free days on their senior discount transit tickets.
These women were recluses. That's a sign that something may be amiss. I have relatives who have pensions that provide a decent life but never go out. We have intervened because they were having medical problems that worsened their psych issues.
There is a difference between being broke and being reclusive.
"There is a difference
"There is a difference between being broke and being reclusive".
Not much.
Grey gardens
This sounds a bit like "Grey Gardens".
The Globe quoted that a neighbor had been asking
The lady where her sister had been, as no one had seen her in a while. She woman would not respond to the question. Obviously the woman has problems, but it's unrelated to the uninformed pot being stirred over at BUR.
Unrealated?
How so?
Seems to me it is a prime example of what happens when mental health issues and isolation interact in a fatal feedback loop.
MA population is getting older and older, too. Going to be a lot more of this.
She walked often, she talked to her neighbors.
She is not an isolated shut-in as suggested in the premise. She is a person with severe mental health problems unrelated to this theory that she was isolated. BUR seeks to somehow claim this was Society's Fault. It wasn't one person who has issues, it was All Of Us. How do you suggest this could have been avoided? Do you want to start looking into which seniors are incompetent and need to be locked up? (for their own good of course). Let's force our way in all their houses and make sure this doesn't happen again!
I think you are missing the point
(adjusts public health hat). Ahem. We don't know what happened in this particular case.
However, we have to be direct and honest about what the future holds. We have a situation where the population of older people around us is expanding rapidly as the baby bomb makes its way through its life stages.
That means MORE situations like this - particularly since these generations were heavily exposed to neurotoxins (airborne lead, cigarettes) associated with various types of dementia. And, simply because there are higher proportions of elders living alone and living long enough to lose their minds.
It really is an important thing to discuss - how are we going to handle this as it becomes increasingly common? That isn't to say that the answer is home invasion or locking people up - both of which you seem to be obsessed with - but to say that not doing anything to head off these problems is NOT an option. This will soon be a serious problem. We need to figure this out - not continue to obsess over singular events like you are, but discuss what the future holds like WBUR is.
Did that get through your head? Good.
We know exactly what happened here, even you.
And it's something that you never heard of before (okay, once), but now think it must be an epidemic to be dealt with. You suddenly are convinced that a wave of elders are bound to do similar things (they used to smoke in those days!). Not a massive over-reaction at all.
Of course the idea of going into peoples homes and locking them up is ridiculous. The question is how do you propose to fight this imagined epidemic among people who don't seek or want help?
What area of public health do you work in?
Do you know anything about surveillance? Epidemilogy?
Clearly not if you think that this is imagined.
Little Brothers
There's an organization called Little Brothers that has opportunities for volunteers to socialize with the elderly in Boston.
http://www.littlebrothersboston.org
I'm so glad my parents live
I'm so glad my parents live in a senior apartment building. Some of the residents never leave their apartments, but for the most part it's like a college dorm for older people. People socialize and look out for each other. My mom is one of the youngest residents and she does whatever she can to help her older friends and neighbors who have a harder time getting around. People know each other's habits, and if they haven't seen someone they check on them. Many of the residents have no family. I love the way they take care of each other. I keep saying I'm going to move there when I'm of the age.
By @swhelman Where the TV shows get it wrong on hoarding
By @swhelman
Where the TV shows get it wrong on hoarding
One Boston advocate has pioneered a humane approach to treating the problem that other cities are copying.
https://www.google.com/search?q=scott+helman+Where+the+TV+shows+get+it+w...