Is there a Paula in yout life?

P.O Box 1540, Albany Western Australia 6331
Phone/Fax: (08) 98 418 418
E-mail: abl-alb@omninet.net.au

Is there a paula in your life
Paula sat alone. Her hands, freckled with age, rested on her lap. She wore her prettiest dress. Her nursing home room embodied Spring-time - daisies in the vase, a tree blooming outside her window. In a soft voice, Paula said: "Sundays are special, you know". Her nursing home wall portrayed her family: an enlargement of grandson Jason hugging "Tigger", the terrier; a framed portrait of her son Timothy, the doctor, and his family in Albany; Paula and her now-dead husband cutting their 40th Wedding Anniversary cake. "It would be have been 50 years next May". Paula sat alone. "They came last Christmas", she brightened, (as if defending her family). A telegram and a birthday card were taped to the dressing table mirror. A Church group sang hymns down the hall. She had done her best to make the room look homely, but one can only do so much. Fifteen hundred kilometres away a family played. Paula is not sick or ugly. She is not useless or decrepit. Paula is simply old. Paula is not senile, though at times, she confesses, the naïveté of senility is tempting. She doesn't suffer from cancer or arthritis. She hasn't had a stroke. No, her disease is much more severe. She suffers from rejection. Our society sometimes has little room for the aged. People like Paula come in abundance. No one intentionally forgets them . . . perhaps that's why it is so painful. If there is a reason: a fight, a mistake, a dispute, but usually it's unintentional. Unintentional rejection! It will kill Paula; she'll die of loneliness. It doesn't matter how nice the Nursing Home is, nurses and other helpers don't replace a grandchild's smile or a son's kiss. The truth is, too many old people suffer more from neglect than from any disease. Friend, is there a Paula in your life? Someone having to grow old without the love and attention you could provide? If so, it's within your control to bring some happiness into her life. "Spend all your love on her now. Forget not the hands, though spotted, The hair, though thinning, The eyes, though dim. For they are a part of you! And when they are gone, a part of you is gone". "They came last Christmas", Paula sighed. Friend, sometimes loneliness is the biggest thing standing between a person and happiness. Therefore, if loneliness has become a dominant part in the life of some elderly person in your family, it's time to respond to that. If you feel that you need some assistance in helping a family member to attack the agony of loneliness, please write to me and ask for your FREE copies of "Attacking the agony of loneliness" and "THE LONELINESS PLAN". To receive your copies by return mail, simply address your request to Discovering A BETTER LIFE, P.O. Box 1540, Albany, W.A. 6331. Or, you may Email telephone your request on: (08) 9841 8418. Never look down on anybody unless You are helping them up. Jesse Jackson

Is there a paula in your life

Paula sat alone. Her hands, freckled with age, rested on her lap. She wore her prettiest dress. Her nursing home room embodied Spring-time - daisies in the vase, a tree blooming outside her window.

In a soft voice, Paula said: "Sundays are special, you know". Her nursing home wall portrayed her family: an enlargement of grandson Jason hugging "Tigger", the terrier; a framed portrait of her son Timothy, the doctor, and his family in Albany; Paula and her now-dead husband cutting their 40th Wedding Anniversary cake. "It would be have been 50 years next May".

Paula sat alone. "They came last Christmas", she brightened, (as if defending her family). A telegram and a birthday card were taped to the dressing table mirror. A Church group sang hymns down the hall. She had done her best to make the room look homely, but one can only do so much.

Fifteen hundred kilometres away a family played. Paula is not sick or ugly. She is not useless or decrepit. Paula is simply old. Paula is not senile, though at times, she confesses, the naïveté of senility is tempting. She doesn't suffer from cancer or arthritis. She hasn't had a stroke. No, her disease is much more severe. She suffers from rejection.

Our society sometimes has little room for the aged. People like Paula come in abundance. No one intentionally forgets them . . . perhaps that's why it is so painful. If there is a reason: a fight, a mistake, a dispute, but usually it's unintentional. Unintentional rejection! It will kill Paula; she'll die of loneliness. It doesn't matter how nice the Nursing Home is, nurses and other helpers don't replace a grandchild's smile or a son's kiss. The truth is, too many old people suffer more from neglect than from any disease.

Friend, is there a Paula in your life? Someone having to grow old without the love and attention you could provide? If so, it's within your control to bring some happiness into her life.
"Spend all your love on her now.
Forget not the hands, though spotted,
The hair, though thinning,
The eyes, though dim.
For they are a part of you!
And when they are gone, a part of you is gone".
"They came last Christmas", Paula sighed.

Friend, sometimes loneliness is the biggest thing standing between a person and happiness. Therefore, if loneliness has become a dominant part in the life of some elderly person in your family, it's time to respond to that. If you feel that you need some assistance in helping a family member to attack the agony of loneliness, please write to me and ask for your FREE copies of "Attacking the agony of loneliness" and "THE LONELINESS PLAN". To receive your copies by return mail, simply address your request to Discovering A BETTER LIFE, P.O. Box 1540, Albany, W.A. 6331. Or, you may Email telephone your request on: (08) 9841 8418.

Never look down on anybody unless
You are helping them up.
Jesse Jackson