lonely old people

There is going to be a lot of lonely old people in the future.  The elderly population is exploding.

Every day I see old people, mostly women, who are alone in life. They never had children.  Their children live in another state.  They are estranged from their children.  A lot of the women have a lot of anxiety. They have nothing else to think about but their various ailments.  So they ruminate on them.

They are the kind of little old ladies who drive you up the wall.  The other day I had a person who was so anxious, it was just terrible.  The first inclination is to just tell them to calm down.  That only ramps them up a lot of the time. So I finally just asked "why are you so anxious?"  The bottom line is they felt out of control with their situation.  They were not in their own place anymore in life, at the mercy of a nursing home
staff.  Unfortunately they were the kind of person who no one could every do anything right for them.

Then the tears started and I learned their only child was in another state, was disinclined to have much to do with them.  No doubt they had their own family to care for and Mom was a bit of a pain in the ass. Mom wanted desperately to go and be with childs family where they lived.  That probably wasn't going to happen. Mom probably burned some bridges long ago.

So here was mom, desperate and lonely, feeling out of control, trying desperately to control things around her, alienating everyone who came in her path.  Now what?  I don't know. Maybe someone will listen to her story once in a while and she can have some temporary attention that she desperately needs.