What Getting Old Really Feels Like For Some

Written by Sam Carr and Chao Fang. Narrated by Marie T. Russell. The pandemic brought the longstanding issue of loneliness and  isolation in the lives of older people back into the public  consciousness. When COVID-19 hit, we had only just completed the 80  in-depth interviews which formed the dataset for what we called The Loneliness Project – a large-scale, in-depth exploration of how older people experience loneliness and what it means for them. Paula*  had not been living in her retirement apartment for very long when I  arrived for our interview. She welcomed me into a modern, comfortable  home. We sat in the living room, taking in the impressive view from her  balcony and our conversation unfolded. Paula, 72, told me  how four years ago she’d lost her husband. She had been his carer for  over ten years, as he slowly declined from a degenerative condition. She  was his nurse, driver, carer, cook and “bottle-washer”. Paula said she  got used to people always asking after her husband and forgetting about  her. She told me: “You are almost invisible … you kind of go in the  shadows as the carer.” While she had obviously been finding life  challenging, it was also abundantly clear that she loved her husband  dearly and had struggled profoundly to cope with his death... Continue Reading at InnerSelf.com (plus audio/mp3 version of article) Music By Caffeine Creek Band, Pixabay Narrated by Marie T. Russell, InnerSelf.com