Older people’s mental health is often overlooked. Here’s how one writer is helping her mother cope with her crippling anxiety and low mood “ Old age is not for the fainthearted.” I can still hear my mother chirping this phrase as she wrapped up anecdotes about sore knees and sick friends.
It was a phrase she picked up from her own mother, who, armed with enviable stoicism, soldiered on to 98. Unfortunately, my mother has not had quite the same “heart” for old age. Six months ago, aged 76, she suffered a mental breakdown , resulting in suicidal depression.
It seemed to happen so quickly – one minute she was enjoying Christmas with my family; then less than a week later my brother went to stay with her and she could barely get out of bed. There was also the crying, the small voice, the despairing utterances..
. all familiar signs. This was not the first time my mother had spiralled into depression.
Previously, though, her bouts of the (severe) blues were triggered by calculable events such as birth or bereavement. This time the trigger seems to have been none other than ageing and its attendants: physical diminishment, social isolation and lack of confidence, each feeding the other in perpetuity. This vicious cycle is a problem for many.
A recent report by Age UK examines the link between mental and physical wellbeing in older people: as we decline physically, becoming naturally less dynamic and mobile, we limit the number of events and interactions; this leads to .