A crushingly distressing indignity
Some of the people ratio-ing Giles Fraser on Twitter are making the same point about people not necessarily wanting their children or other loved ones wiping their bums, and preferring strangers to do it.
I mean, perhaps she went quiet because she was thinking "but I never had to worry about my babies finding it a crushingly distressing indignity that their own middle aged child was wiping their arse" who knows, eh.
— Hugo Rifkind (@hugorifkind) February 22, 2019
We persuaded my Dad to come live with me for end of life care rather than go to a hospice. His one condition was that I wouldn't be the one to wipe his arse. He had too much dignity to allow that. Giles, you shouldn't make judgments on situations which you know nothing about.
— GroundhoppingGirl (@GrndhoppingGrl) February 22, 2019
Have you ever done 24/7 care for a loved one, Giles? Have you ever been disabled and valued the dignity of social care? Have you ever been poor and unable to give up your poverty wages to “wipe bottoms” of your parents? Have you ever been a woman and therefore expected to?
— Frances Ryan (@DrFrancesRyan) February 22, 2019
They have no idea of the guilt we have as we rely upon others to help us do the most simple task, they have no care that their solution would leave us without the care we need, they have zero idea that we would not always ask for help. It appears that Giles has no empathy Frances
— dean hodges (@ludowhufc) February 22, 2019
OMG. The idea that I would want my son to give up his dreams, his ambitions, his chances at happiness in life just so he can permanently live down the road and be available to wipe my bum when I'm elderly, is the ultimate in total selfishness.
— Christabel Cooper (@ChristabelCoops) February 22, 2019
Lucky me, I have a daughter, but I've encouraged her to go to a college far from home if that's what she wants, and while I'd miss her dearly, I didn't raise her to be my servant, I raised her to be happy. Wanting anything else for your child is selfish twaddle.
— Jeff Fecke (@jkfecke) February 22, 2019
My daughter has been my carer for the last five-and-a-half years, but only because I don’t need personal care yet. She has been doing my shopping and laundry, has been making my bed and my meals, and has been driving me to appointments etc. whilst my husband has been working abroad. The government gives her a small pension to compensate for not being able to go out to work full-time, which she wasn’t keen on doing anyway whilst her youngest was still small. Now my husband is retired and can take over, she plans to go back to college to get a teaching diploma to add to her degree, and then get full-time work.
Had I needed personal care, I would have got in a professional carer; and when I do get that bad, I still plan to. I saw what caring for my disabled mother-in-law did to my father-in-law, and I don’t want that happening to my husband when I can avail of a team of professionals instead. Oh, and the reason my daughter has been my carer rather than one of my sons is that we have been sharing the family home (it belonged to us, and now belongs to her) whilst her brothers all live elsewhere. Her brothers have stepped up whenever she and her family take a holiday.