Health and Social Care - OU Community Online

In the first of a series of posts on living with a shortened life expectancy, retired OU lecturer Jill Reynolds writes from the heart, and of her own experiences...

I was given the diagnosis of pancreatic cancer a few months ago, and was shocked to learn that the average life expectancy from time of diagnosis is six months.  Some people I’ve known quote Pete Townshend’s ‘Hope I die before I get old’ as a theme close to their hearts.

I’ve just been reading Joan Barfoot’s 2008 novel Exit Lines and was drawn along by the plot which features a set of people brought together by their entry into a local care home: the Idyll Inn. Ruth has osteoarthritis and her body is quite twisted:  someone apparently not so happy in old age, perhaps ensuing pain is what has led her to decide that she will take her own life? A further possibility is that Ruth never had any children: does this mean that since her husband’s death she has no feelings for anyone left who needs her?  She looks to her three new companions in care to give her help with her planned exit. They are alarmed and puzzled as to why she is so determined to end it all: they were getting on so well, did she pick them out at first encounter as people who would fall in with her challenging request?

It seems Ruth is not depressed, and doesn’t hate her life but has an overall sense of discouragement about the world. In contrast, I was more than willing to explore the paths and possibilities of old age and take things as they come. My hopes of exploration suddenly cut off:  ‘I’m only 63, that hardly even counts as being old!’ Apparently my imagined visit to the future to learn from the Jill aged 80+ What do we know about being old and childless: an interview with my future self  was just that – imagination?
So many questions: how do I tell my friends? Who are my friends? How much do they want to know? How do I feel now about my long-held ambitions for retirement – travelling to South America, improving my Spanish and getting an OU degree in modern language studies? What about the loss of plans now unlikely to be achieved? Are there any positives – what are the things that I now don’t have to do? Can I take each day as a gift and extract maximum pleasure from it?

'So I’d like to go on record here as saying that at times of need, caring and love received, whether from friends or partner, are of incredible value'

Luckily I don’t have to deal with all these questions alone. People talk about ‘journeys’: a friend writes ‘I hope this one can have some good aspects. It is a journey for us too’. I think she means that friends are sharing my journey with me, whether willingly or unwillingly, almost like Ruth’s poor companions who were compelled to engage with her death plans.  As well as giving me their support, they are dealing with their own sense of loss and grief. She also of course may have in mind that none of us really know for sure when we are going to die and we all have to face this happening at some time, whether or not we get some advance warning.

In particular my husband Dave has been a solid support and wonderful friend: he acts as PA dealing with my medical appointments and tests; researches information about nutrition and other health-promoting actions; makes fantastic vegetable and fruit juices and ‘build-up’ drinks; fights my battles in sorting out pension details; cries and laughs with me and gives me love and affection.

My writing on singleness and childlessness does not view them as states to be pitied – beyond the range of what is ‘normal’ – but as states that are often outside our ability to change, and needing to become part of our more general understanding of possibilities for life as a whole (see The Single Woman: a Discursive Investigation, Jill Reynolds published by Routledge.)

None of my writings should be taken as critical of marriage or partnership as such, simply of the privileging of such long-term relationships as the ‘normal’ and therefore ‘to be expected’ pathway that lives should take. So I’d like to go on record here as saying that at times of need, caring and love received, whether from friends or partner, are of incredible value.

This is the first in what I hope will be a series of blogs on living with a shortened life expectancy, in which I’ll aim to address some of my questions above. I'm not the only person facing this likelihood, and I hope that if you have a similar experience, or know someone who does, you will post a comment here – your companionship will be welcome to me.

Jill Reynolds
2 April 2012
 

Picture caption: At times of need, caring and love received is of great value

• You can read Jill's second post - 'how do I tell friends I have cancer?' - here.

Today (21 March 2012) is the International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination and to mark it, the OU has published a collection of audio tracks on iTunes U.

The collection includes a series on crime, order and social control, visiting UK communities to explore the issues of criminal justice and crime control initiatives, including a track on the killing of Stephen Lawrence.

There’s also a collection on race and rights, looking at how the legal system impacts on the lives of social workers; and another on classifying races, offering an insight into how large communities are organised to regulate their social behaviour.

• Visit the OU on iTunes U

The Bisexuality Report, the first of its kind in the UK and the product of research led by Dr Meg Barker, senior lecturer in Psychology at the OU, looks at bisexual inclusion and equality issues.

The report was launched on February 15 at 2012 BiUK in collaboration with the Centre for Citizenship, Identities and Governance and the Faculty of Health and Social Care at The Open University. It summarises national and international evidence and draws out recommendations for future bisexual inclusion in many different settings.

The report is part of Meg Barker's research on the bisexual community, particularly in the UK. She said: “Government policy and equalities agendas generally consider lesbian, gay and bisexual issues together.

“However, bisexual people often face prejudice from within lesbian and gay groups as well as heterosexual communities. They are invisible – not represented in mainstream media, policy, and legislation or within lesbian and gay communities.

“Government and communities need to single out bisexual people as a separate group in order to address this equality gap.”

The Bisexuality Report: Bisexual inclusion in LGBT equality and diversity was written by Meg Barker; Rebecca Jones, Lecturer, Health & Social Care at the OU; Christina Richards; Helen Bowes-Catton, PhD student in the Psychology Department at The Open University; and Tracy Plowman – all of BiUK, with Jen Yockney, of Bi Community News; and Marcus Morgan, of The Bisexual Index.

Listen to Dr Meg Barker and Rebecca Jones, both lecturers at the OU, talk about the topics covered in The Bisexuality Report in this podcast.

And in this two-minute video Meg sums up the key findings of the report…

Find out more:

• Read The Bisexuality Report
• Study with the OU – Psychology
• More about Dr Meg Barker
• BiUK, national organisation for bisexual research and activism

Could you handle 24 hours facing some of the challenges that confront social workers?

Devised by Barry and Lucy and with extracts from the BBC/OU programme Protecting Our Children, A Day in the Life... provides you with the opportunity to step into a social worker's shoes and to experience a 'typical day in the office’.

Find out more:

• Go to the interactive video A Day in the Life...
• Study Social Work with the OU

Dr Rai believes the new series confronts viewers with some of the classic challenges of child protection.

Protecting Our Children follows five lead social workers from Bristol City Council and highlights the life-changing decisions they make on a daily basis for the city’s children

It documents the trials of a social worker’s job and the complex decisions they have to make, focusing on social work’s most critical dilemma; when it is right to remove a child and when it is safe for them to be reunited. Social work involves a careful balancing act and often involves social workers putting themselves in vulnerable positions to risk assess a child’s household.

Protecting Our Children is on BBC Two and the BBC HD Channel on Monday nights at 9.00pm from Monday 30 Janauary.

Find out more:

• OpenLearn: Protecting our children
• BA (Honours) Social Work Studies
• Try a day in the life of a social worker
   

• Autism Speaks: details of the project
• Study with the OU SK124 'understanding the autism spectrum'
• OpenLearn: What is autism?
• OpenLearn: Dispel some myths around autism and talent
• Test your knowledge in the Autism quiz: busting the myths