HOW TO BE TREATED LIKE AN ADULT - ACT LIKE ONE

LINKS BELOW ARE TO ESSAYS FOUND ON OTHER SITES

1) .Another stereotype: old age as a second childhood

Aging, August-Sept, 1984, by Arnold Arluke, Jack Levin

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2) .Conscious Aging

The subject of this article is being near the end of life, your own or someone else's. The important thing, when death is inevitable (as it surely is when you've lived enough years), is to get around to accepting it, and not only to accept the idea of death (not to ignore or dispense with the grief, but to accept that, too, yet see it in perspective), but also just to accept aging and to make the most of where we are rather than to try to "stay young." There are a few parts of this article that make me cringe, as they seem to assume some "spiritual" "facts" that I personally do not accept as valid, yet it is very much worth reading in my opinion, as there is much that is wise and comforting in it.

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3) . Intergenerational Day Care Programs:
..... Beneficial For Older Persons Or Infantilizing?

This article is about how "intergenerational" daycare (where both children and elderly receive daycare together...There are reasons for this, described in the article), can cause a situation in which the elderly are - in some facilities - treated more like children (presumably even more so than would be the case without the little ones around). The differences in the different facilities that lead to different outcomes are described and are thought-provoking. Needless to say, those where the elderly were treated as adults are the successful ones.

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4) . Sweet nothings - effects of elderspeak

Older people are treated in a patronizing way, called "Dearie" and "Sweetie" and commanded or coaxed as if they were little children. Treating them like children makes many of them become like children, especially when they aren't around much of anyone except those kinds of "caregivers" who so often treat them this way. Further, we encourage older people to rest and not do the things they used to do, believing the poor old things need and deserve to refrain from physical activity, when actually they need exercise just like everyone else, and need to do things for themselves.