Middle-age and miserable
As I have entered into my middle years, I’ve found that I seem to have lost the spontaneity and sense of wonder that characterized the years that came before. The highs are not quite as high; the lows are more persistent. I’ve blamed these changes on years of poor decision making that had finally caught up with me. I don’t know if it’s a relief to discover that it may be normal to be miserable in the middle years.
According to an article in the Los Angeles Times, a recent study conducted by economists has shown that happiness follow a universal curve with the greatest level of bliss during the beginning and end of life. They found this was consistent around the globe.
Unless you feel that middle age misery is inevitable, different research shows that for those who are financially secure with a happy marital life, the middle years can be the happiest years.
Have hospitals forsakened their mission of doing no harm?
Hospitals have been one of the few remaining places where we could expect employees to embody qualities of altruism and civility. The story in the papers not too long ago about the hospital staff that did nothing to help a woman who suffered excruciating pain before dying in the hospital waiting room made me wonder if that was changing. I was persuaded to think of that episode as an aberration. But, then just a couple of weeks ago, there was another story about a hospital that dumped a paraplegic man on skid row. Then there was the story of a woman in her 60s dumped wearing only a hospital gown, and there were other stories about patients being dumped on skid row, including one who was not even homeless, and I was again beset by fears that hospitals were no longer places where the motto “Above all, do no harm,” governed. I’m afraid my family’s recent experience at a hospital in Los Angeles County has only increased my fears.
I won’t go into all the details, but suffice to say that a close family member, who underwent the trauma of losing one leg above the knee last year, unexpectedly lost the second leg just recently. He was released from one hospital only to have to be rushed to another by ambulance a few days later. The family understandably tried to seek information on him. But it seemed no one at the hospital knew where he was and even worse, no one cared to find out. After a lot of effort on the part of his family, it was finally revealed that lack of space at the admitting hospital caused him to be transferred to a different hospital. When questioned as to why this information was not made available to the family, one employee snidely remarked, “We don’t have to give you that information.” Not seeking out his family to share information is one thing, but making information almost impossible to obtain is another. If his family hadn’t located him, is it possible that the hospital would also have dumped him on skid row?
These stories validate my sense that our gradual disinvestment in the social welfare of our citizens, and government’s support for increasing wealth for those in the top tier at the expense of the rest of us is gradually eroding within our nation qualities of civilities and compassion, the very qualities that make us human.
