The saga of various attacks on my neighbour, an elderly woman whose mental struggles of decades was weaponized against her to get her apartment (for major Vancouver $$) is interwoven with what Donna was like upon returning from a visit to a respite locale to get myself a break.
November 16, 2017
A couple of updates on myself and the people in and around the apartment. I needed and managed to get a break and feel a lot more strength to move forward.
Mom got in last night from a five day respite where I recharged. She came home happy, and that’s the most important part. But of the things I am most concerned about when she goes into a respite (which are: How is her health/eating, how is her medication, how is her hygiene, how is her property, how respected is she by staff, how is her spirit)– Well, the only thing good to say is actually the most important one: she was very happy and did not have that long distant, vacant look she gets when completely disoriented and emotionally defeated by circumstance.
Because her emotional space is the most important thing, the fact that EVERY SINGLE OTHER ISSUE (she was not clean, her meds got screwed up, she didn’t eat enough, 3 clothing items are gone/ rest were returned soiled and she was a little weaker upon getting home) was problematic left me very irritated but not ‘fighting mood’ irritated. Glad to have mom home and not have major knots in my neck at the same time.
Speaking of women getting home to their apartments, My Neighbour whose story I have recounted here a few times has been discharged from the hospital. This is news that means one thing, and one thing only:
Her daughter illegally used the mental health system to steal her apartment. That has now happened, and M will not know how to fight back. She has been bullied since long before I was born due to her bi-polar and other peoples’ ignorance and will not be learning how to defend herself at 79.
But for the grace of (insert deity here), she was discharged. I now can tell you she has been determined to be free– and simultaneously the fact that her daughter stole all of her things and her home using the mental health pretext should be taken up as a criminal charge. But what is most disgusting was watching this whole process happen in slow motion and the shitty petty bourgeois idiots in my building happily abuse this woman.
Saying nothing to abuse is to condone it. This is true of child sexual abuse, of marital spousal abuse, of boss-employee abuse, and it is certainly true of elder abuse.
Which of this short list is the only one where even “leftists” or “allies” of victims-cum-survivors still wrap themselves up in “that’s a family issue, not my concern, none of your business…”?
The people in this building– who have known of M’s issues for a pair of decades– just watched an illegal stealing of an apartment, the use of BC Mental Health as a weapon for leverage, the theft of all of her property and the forcible confinement in a hospital of a woman who was ultimately discharged and had lost her home in the meantime.
The people in my building are not different than the people in your building. The truth is, people do not help elders because elder victims seldom have the wherewithal in many different ways to become survivors. They are isolated and have the self-advocacy skills only slightly higher than children under 12.
Chew on this. Think on this. Act.
I only wish my neighbour had the time or the inclination to sue.