Below is a response to an article about a woman who thought her sister (who was suffering from dementia) was not getting the quality of long term care that she expected. The demented sister was being given a drug to control her behavior (the article does not specify what the unacceptable behavior is) but there were undesirable size effects (as there always is with any drug).
One cannot help asking why wasn't this woman's sister kept at home? The answer can only be because the demented sister was impossible to control and was put in an LTC facility. The woman, having unburdened herself of her crazy sister, now feels she is free to complain. She is, of course, projecting her guilt for abandoning her sister onto the poor staff who, somehow, have to manage an unmanageable dementia patient (and without the use of drugs). Perhaps she thought that individual counseling was a viable option, free of charge, of course.
If I may paraphrase Col. Jessup from A Few Good Men:
“You weep for your sister Linda and you curse the LTC facilities. You have that luxury because you have off loaded the burden of caring for your demented sister to others. The treatment of your sister, while grotesque and incomprehensible to you, is the best care care possible within the available budget.
Your sister could have had the finest care that money could buy. All you had to do was keep your sister at home and cough up the money for private nurses and other caregivers. But the truth is that you won’t do that. You want other people to pay for her “money-is-no-object" long term care. But you don’t want the truth because deep down in places you don’t talk about at parties, you don’t want to take care of your crazy sister. You and the rest of your family should have had a talk about the proper way to die before you got into this mess. I’ll bet you have never used the words duty, sacrifice and honor to govern the end of life healthcare.
We accept the principle of dying for one’s country - if one’s country is in jeopardy - because it is one’s duty. And it is dishonorable to do otherwise. Well, how about the duty to die for one’s family if one’s continued existence puts the family in jeopardy? But the woman does not want to do her duty. Actually she probably thinks duty, sacrifice and honor are quaint anachronisms. But the taxpayers of this country should not have to commit, either in time or in inclination, to explain themselves to irresponsible people who rise and sleep under the blanket of the very healthcare system that they provide and then question the manner in which they provide it.
Personally, I would rather you just said thank you, and went on your way, otherwise, I suggest you provide your own end of life healthcare at home and accept that burden. Either way, I don’t give a damn what you think you are entitled to.”
Excellent!
Well done.