Memo to men: time to check your Brownie points now..
 Consider this a health warning: if you have a woman in your life and hope that she will
look after you in your old age, make sure you’re sharing the chores and generally
pulling your weight around the house.
Since women live longer than men, the likelihood is that men get ill and need care first. But there’s no guarantee that they will get it from
their partners, even after 60 years of marriage.
A social worker helping the very elderly, tells me that it
is not at all uncommon for wives to suggest putting their husbands into care when they are
ready to return home from hospital after a major health crisis such as a stroke.
The women, it
seems, having tasted a breath of freedom, are not too keen on going back to shopping,
cooking, cleaning, ironing and generally tidying up for someone who spends a great deal of
his time in front of the television or behind a newspaper.
This shocking news backs up something I heard many years
ago when researching facilities in residential homes for couples. Some married partners actually choose to go into
separate homes, opting in old age for an informal separation which they’d never got
round to earlier in life. So much for Darby and Joan, whoever they were, and
the poetic optimism of ‘Grow old along
with me, the best is yet to be’.
To redress the balance, it is worth recounting the story
of a widower, in his late 70s, who is looking for a companion to accompany him on
holidays. He is fairly fit, a good swimmer, lively,
dresses well and for all I know is willing to take to the dance floor (a great asset
apparently).
 He attends various social
gatherings so his wish for a holiday companion (no strings/no sex), should be easily
fulfilled, with so many more unattached older women
than men floating around. But it doesn’t work
out like that.
He says the women sit
together in a regular cluster, and it is seriously bad etiquette to take
someone’s seat. He feels himself to be an
outsider, excluded from much of the gossip and laughter. And
although he has had offers from women ready to accompany him on a holiday, they say they will only consider it if he pays for
them.
Clearly the women don’t care. They are quite happy being independent of men. Except for the fact that they still expect a
man to foot the bill.
Sadly, equality
never seems to work both ways.
This Later Life…
Three Radio 2 veterans are clocking up
millions of new listeners says the Radio Joint Audience Research unit. Jimmy Young, aged 80, has an audience of 5.8 million -
that includes 900,000 new fans in the past year. Terry
Wogan, 63, has a record 7.46 million listeners. And Ken Bruce, 51, had a million new listeners in the
last year, bringing his total to 6.3 million.
89 year old Donald Turner is a great
success as a supply teacher in Essex. His
lessons cover science, geography - or whatever the school needs - and he has even led a
lunch break session in line dancing, in which the headmistress participated. Mr Turner retired from the Ministry of Defence in 1978
and has no formal training as a teacher. He says,
‘Why shouldn’t older people work, provided they are fit enough?’ Why not indeed? Mr
Turner was placed by the supply agency, Teaching Personnel, and is on the books of the
local council.
Got any contributions to THAT’S later LIFE? Send them to Helen@laterlife.com
|
Talkback is a regular
feature in laterlife.com run by journalist and author Helen Franks. 
