Transcriber: Ilze Garda Reviewer: Denise RQ
Mary Sharpe: Dorothy is soon to celebrate her 87th birthday,
and she is an expert on ageing by virtue of experience
for various governmental and non-governmental groups.
She has written a lot
and worked in lots and lots of committees about ageing
trying to get dignity for the aged.
She works a lot with her peers to bring awareness to everyone
about the rights and needs,
but also what the older people have to contribute to the society.
She is redefining ageing.
So, Dorothy, you've got a few questions that you want to ask the audience.
Dorothy Runnicles: I'm sort of interested
in who our audience is at this minute and, of course, in the future.
But I would like to ask you
how many of you know an older person, say 70 and over, well?
How many of you know an older person well?
MS: Oh, that is a pretty healthy group.
We were expecting a few less, but it is maybe about 60% of the audience,
so there is certainly room for improvement there.
DR: I was going to ask how many are over 80,
but I don't think there is too many, so we won't ask that question.
But I'm very pleased that you do know an older person well,
because that is what the solidarity is about.
MS: What could we do, Dorothy, to increase the solidarity between the generations?
DR: I think you need to get to know your favourite older person better.
I think you will learn a lot for yourselves,
and for your future, and for your children
if you actually include the older person in your life
whom you already know,
or if you don't know one, get to know a new friend,
and you can find older people in prisons, in care homes.
(Laughter)
MS: In prisons!
DR: They are in every walk of society.
They are probably your next door neighbour,
they are in your street or in your community club,
and in your pub.
So get to know one person well and spend time with them.
MS: Older people sometimes seem a bit of a burden.
I mean, let's be honest, that's why a lot of people think,
"Oh, I've got too much to do, I've got too many fun things to do."
We really don't want to have to be bothered.
So what do you see that older people contribute to society?
DR: They are a very big business, there is lots of money made on us.
(Laughter)
We spend a lot of money on care services and other services,
and buying things for our younger generation,
we pay out in lots of ways,
so we are a big business, we're part of your economic community,
we provide lots of jobs.
We also provide and provoke wisdom and compassion in others in many cases.
We are very diverse, of course, all colours, all shapes, all sizes.
But we're also, I think, guardians of our spiritual heritage,
we try very hard to be humans,
more so in our older age perhaps than when we were younger.
We also provide a huge amount of grandparenting, child care for free.
(Laughter)
So that's an asset you may already be benefiting from.
And you will know that older people provide
an enormous amount of help for each other.
There is a lot of mutual support that goes on,
and some of the most important support networks between older people
are each other.
So keep those networks going,
make sure that they don't shrink too fast and too far,
otherwise you'll have a stubborn older person in your midst.
Keep the networks going,
keep your older person in the loop, as I say.
Dementia or no dementia, still keep them in the loop.
MS: Great. So from your experience,
what intergenerational projects are really working well out there?
DR: I'm working in various fields at the moment.
It's quite an honour to be a paid worker after 17 years of volunteering
- there is lots of volunteering out there by older people,
contributing to research programmes,
contributing their voice to providers of services -
but the three programmes I'd like to just briefly mention
that I think are hopeful for the future, have a more human touch.
One is the extent to which homeshare is providing homes.
People with too large houses
and wanting to have someone sharing their large house with them
are in a homeshare scheme, maybe in your area.
There is also maybe a shared life scheme
which is a formal arrangement
where you take an older person into your home
and share the care that way,
providing a more personalised care through having a person in the home.
It's not a one-way street, you'll benefit both sides.
And none of these things are one-way streets,
I learnt most of my wisdom from my mother during her last 20 years,
10 of which were with dementia.
It's a very good learning curve for all of us.
MS: And we're all going to get old, all being well, so...
DR: But then, yes, hopefully, you may want to live it to a great age.
But there is one other project
which has been going on for some years in Cambridge where I came from earlier,
and that is called Cambridge Celebrates Age.
And if we celebrate age rather than worry about our age,
just boast about it as I do.
MS: Great.
Now, Dorothy you've mentioned before that there was a problem with ageism,
and that actually old people themselves clued in that.
DR: Well, when I was younger, I was sexist, and I was racist,
and I had to learn that they were part of my culture
which I had to overcome with new learning and new awareness.
Now I recommend you to try and recognise ageism in our society.
It's rife, it's there, it's holding back our services,
it's holding back our inclusion of older people
and benefiting from what they can help us with.
So, please, recognise and take action on ageism.
MS: So what practical things could you suggest to us here today
that actually improve the links between generations?
DR: I think that if we could all collectively share things,
share knowledge, share concerns,
and I'm quite sure that grandparents do a lot of sharing and caring,
and that is part of our culture already,
but there is quite a lot of disengagement in families,
people moving away in different countries,
but that is still very important,
so, please, keep in touch in practical ways, on weekly basis,
with your loved ones who are older.
If they are in care homes,
make sure that you safeguard them and see how they are getting on.
If they are in hospital
- well, you've seen all the news lately about older people in hospital -
be very vigilant with them there.
Keep a close eye on your senior friends and so on, your neighbours.
There is lots of practical things to do to keep them in the loop,
making and helping them with their cards on Christmas,
or their social networks, or telephone calls,
or cutting their toe nails.
There is all sorts of practical things that friends do for them.
And you may choose to do something very simple
like a very small beginning, no beginning is too small.
MS: Great, Dorothy.
Now, we've looked at celebrating age and about joining the last lap,
but what about death?
How do we prepare for a good death?
DR: Well, I believe that we should talk about death.
It's a taboo subject with older people and others,
- as in my younger days we didn't talk about childbirth -
but I think we need to talk about death
because it would help us prepare for death and make for a better death.
We can't influence entirely when we die, but there is lots of things we can do.
We can know what our options are,
we can seek the place, as well as the environment,
the people we want with us.
There is lots of writing about all of these subjects,
there is a huge literature on death and dying
to which I contributed about 7 or 8 years ago.
And it's possible to actually think about how you want to die
because it is not a good journey for everyone,
and I've compared good and bad deaths in my own experience,
and this is about compassion, skill, understanding, knowledge.
Many of our professionals haven't got that training,
and we are still very bizarre ourselves,
I mean, how many of you have experienced a personal death?
MS: Now, Dorothy, you've told me about an incident recently
where you were invited to a friend who was complaining
that she was in hospital, and she wasn't being treated properly.
DR: I was sent for by a friend whom I had known for 50 years,
we brought up our children at the same time
and formed the same efforts together to improve lives then.
She sent for me at the very last stage of her life, she was dying of cancer,
nothing more could be done to help her.
But she was in a hospital
where there were absolutely no preparation or plans for dying people,
and she had been moved to four wards in the local hospital,
from one ward to another, there was no peace for her,
and she threw her drips and drops,
and in her dying state pleaded with me
to persuade them to let her die peacefully.
That was outrageous in my view that she hadn't got the environment
in which to die with peace and rest with loved ones around her.
A good death can be achieved,
we got the examples in hospices and elsewhere.
We have pathways in our health service which says this could happen,
but it's not happening yet.
Please, help it to happen by talking about death.
MS: Do you think it's part of the problem
that the health service just focuses so much on keeping people alive?
DR: Yes, indeed, that is the doctors' wish to keep people alive longer and longer,
and we talk about how we want to die and when we want to die now.
We're talking much more about when we would like to die,
and I think that is a topic in the last lap
that you are entitled to talk about.
MS: Thank you. Some people talk about living wills and advance directives.
DR: Yes, there are steps you can take
in order to let your families know once you talk about it with them.
They will be able to write advanced care planning documents we have
which we can get.
We can conform lasting powers of attorney
which give others the right, with our wishes,
but we must actually be asked our opinions on this.
Do get to know what your older friends and relatives want,
let them choose the subjects, let them choose the ways
because we are very diverse in our religious beliefs, our faiths,
our wishes.
If you don't get to know them,
you are going to be in trouble when it gets to the event.
MS: Thank you, it's really important to talk about that
and talk about if they believe in an afterlife, or a spiritual life,
if that has been important to them.
Now, Dorothy, you are a great role model for the rest of us.
We saw a picture of you as a pin-up girl there
in a swimming costume playing with dolphins.
I hope that I can be doing that when I'm your age, happily.
What would you say is the secret of a healthy and active older age?
DR: It's a tough one, that question.
I think I've been fortunate in so many ways,
but I think you need to accept living with disabilities,
- they are very common in older age
we've extended lives, we haven't finished working out
how to stop all the disadvantages of the ageing process yet -
but we need to exercise, we need to lead a sensible life with a diet
- I do exercise in a gym every day -
and we need to do the things that we know help us in this direction.
But most important of all is being included,
being included with my family, my friends in activities,
and that I have a point of view
that can be expressed and will be listened to.
MS: Great, Dorothy. So basically ageing is not for sissies, aye?
- DR: Old age is not for sissies. - MS: Definitely not.
DR: I think it's a positive approach which many of you already have,
you're here today in this sparkling new way of learning,
and just coming here is for me a great learning curve.
MS: Well, Dorothy, thank you very much for your wisdom,
as you've mentioned, as the time goes past the importance of compassion,
both for older people and for older people towards the younger generation.
So, ladies and gentlemen, please join me in thanking Dorothy.
(Applause)