My Diary 05 The Old Folks Home

My Diary 05 - The Old Folks Home by Emily Harrison

Before my University degree course started, and with some spare time on my hands, I had decided to do some voluntary work. I knew Miss Torbolt, who lived downstairs, worked at the local care home just a few hundred metres to the left of our flats. So, after a few chats with her about volunteering, I asked if she could mention my willingness to help out to the manager. On Monday morning, just two days later, I received a phone call from the Manager of the care home, Mr MacGregor.

And, in a matter of days, there I was, sitting in Mr MacGregors' office on a gloomy rainy Wednesday morning, listening to him detail some of the tasks that an unqualified volunteer, such as myself, would be asked to help out with. It was going to be some of the more menial jobs, of course, I had no illusions about anything else, but one of the main things was going to be simply talking with the residents. I love chatting, especially with older people, so I knew I was going to enjoy my time there.

After our chat, which seemed to have gone well because he was now talking about dates I could start, he walked me around the different areas of the home.

As we walked through the day room, the residents all seemed happy and content, extremely well cared for, the facilities were exemplary and the attentive staff were all very smiley, friendly and respectful of their charges. I just knew this was going to be an enjoyable and worthwhile use of my spare time.

After introductions to some of the residents and some of the permanent staff, I was left with Anne, one of the senior carers, so she could briefly outline the routines.

A little later, Mr MacGregor sought me out and asked if I could start the following day. Delighted to have been accepted, I agreed and with Anne leading the way, I went to the staffroom to be issued with the standard uniform. An all-in-one, light blue, studded front uniform dress, ending about 3 or 4 inches above the knee. Very economical fashion-wise, but it was functional. I had noticed that some of the carers wore trousers with a tunic top, but Anne was wearing the dress, as I had been issued, she said it was much easier and more comfortable in the summer months.

After a few hours and having said my goodbyes to Anne, Mr MacGregor and a few of the residents I'd already been introduced to, I made my way home.

The next day, I arrived on time for my first day on the job. Anne took me into the staff changing room where, as she was giving me a brief overview of the residents (all eighteen of them, eight men and ten ladies), I changed into my tunic dress. Anne went through some of their routines, their personalities, the wanderers (those that had a habit of just walking out through the front door in their dressing gowns etc), and after fastening up the last of the button studs, Anne took me for a walk around the home to introduce me to all the residents.

I won't bore you with the names and descriptions of everyone, but a few need mentioning as they were introduced. Ages and extra info gleaned from further enquiries or if the residents offered up that piece of information, which a few did, whether that was because they had managed to reach such an age or as one or two said, 'don't ever get old Luv, I'd never thought I'd be 86'.

The first of those was Reg. An 87-year-old with a bald head, but with a little grey hair around the sides, quite a handsome man, but obviously declining physically with age. He was sitting in an armchair with his walking stick at his side, engrossed in a magazine as we approached. As his eyes focussed in on us, there was a sparkle. Such a sweet smile and I immediately took to him.

"This is Emily," said Anne, as she introduced me to Reg, "and this lovely gentleman is Reg". "Emily will be helping us out until she starts University".

"Such a pleasure my dear," said Reg, proffering a hand for me to shake as he lowered his magazine onto his lap. And such a gentleman too, as he brought my hand to his lips and kissed it, just like you see in the old movies.

"Reg is just here for a short stay, while he recovers from his knee replacement," said Anne, "He'll be back home in a couple of weeks, and hopefully he'll be taking that lot with him," she said with a smile, "he loves his magazines," she said, nodding towards a small pile of 'Amateur Photographer' magazines on the floor at his side.

After a brief chat, we were off to the next resident.

As we approached Bob, Anne whispered in my ear.

"Watch this one, Emily."

I didn't know what she meant and it was too late to ask now, as she began the introductions.

Bob was 93, one of the oldest residents at the home, and to be honest he looked like he was asleep, as he barely acknowledged our introductions, it was as though he had already given up and was just waiting for his time.

As we left Bob and headed to the next resident, Anne again whispered, with a half-smile on her face "Don't be deceived sweetheart, looks can be deceptive." Again, I had no idea what she was talking about.

Anne introduced me to a succession of residents, all friendly and cheery, all happily whiling away their time on a number of different pastimes. It seemed that everyone was happy, so well cared for and by and large, happy with their lot.

During the day, as I helped out on various tasks, I got to talk to the majority of residents. It was incredibly tiring, but I had thoroughly enjoyed it.

As I soaked in the bath that night, my feet finally resting after a full day on the go, I reflected on how much I had enjoyed my first day.

Two days later I was back, I had volunteered to help out on the night shift. One of the full-time carers, Kathy, was on duty with me. As we were getting into our uniforms she mentioned that another carer was ill, so we'd have to manage on our own. This, as she explained, shouldn't be a problem as the residents were mostly on medication to help them sleep, so it should be fairly quiet.

As the shift began, Kathy explained that each resident had a buzzer situated at their bedside for emergencies. Apparently, it was normally just a few who buzzed during the night, mostly when help was needed getting to the toilet. So far, all was quiet.

At about 1.30 am, the buzzer for one of the female residents Sophie buzzed. As Kathy got up to attend to her, she asked if I'd be ok if another buzzer buzzed. I couldn't see any problems, so with confirmation from me, off she went to attend to Sophie.

It seemed that as soon as Kathy was out of sight, another buzzer went off. It was Bob's room.

I quickly scribbled a note to Kathy telling her where I was, left it on the desk and went to attend to Bob.

On entering Bob's room, he had already put his bedside light on and was waiting.

"What's wrong Bob, how can I help?" I said.

"Oh it's you," he said, "well I need the bathroom, I need some help."

As each resident had their own 'en-suite' toilet attached to their rooms, it was an easy task to help Bob out of bed and into the en-suite. As I got Bob inside, he just stood there. I guessed he was waiting for me to leave before he used the loo, but I was mistaken.

"Because of my hands, I need help when I'm in the bathroom, would you mind?" He said holding his hands up in a rigid position.

I was totally unaware of Bob's medical condition and the problem with his hands, but I guess this is all part of the job.

Raising his still rigid hands out of the way and looking at me in a helpless way, it was obvious he was asking for me to help him.

"Ok let's undo these," I said as I untied the cord of his pyjama bottoms and getting onto my knees, lowered them to his ankles. I guess I'm far too much of an innocent to have realised at that moment that Bob wasn't too old to be stringing me along and the fact that his rather large penis seemed to be increasing in size, just inches from and right in front of my eyes, still didn't register.

"I need to shit," he said as, with my help, he eased himself down onto the toilet seat. The use of that word shocked me for a second, I wouldn't have imagined any of the residents using such words, they all seemed to be from another generation, a generation more gentile maybe.

"Do you want me to wait outside?" I said as I made a move to leave him for some privacy.

"No you'll need to stay," he said, as he started the process of emptying his bowels.

The sounds and the smells coming from him, for a second made me feel a little nauseous, but I instantly got a grip, inwardly telling myself that this was all part of the job. After a couple of minutes, he was done. As he raised himself off the toilet seat, he started to turn and bend forward slightly, his bottom now facing me.

"You'll need to wipe me too," he said, raising his rigid hands once again as he spoke.

The thought entered my mind "What on earth had I been thinking, when I offered to volunteer for this?" But if this was part of the job, then so be it.

As I tore a few sheets from the toilet roll and with my hand on his elderly back to steady him, my hand went between his bum cheeks and wiped. As I brought it back out it was obvious his bottom would require quite a few more wipes before it was clean. So this is what I did, each piece of soiled toilet paper going into the toilet bowl and on top of a very large poo.

When he was clean, I flushed the toilet and with him straightening up and turning to face me, he had a smile on his face and a now very hard penis pointing out towards me.

Trying to keep my professional carer face and demeanour under control I squatted in front of him as I pulled his pyjama bottoms up, with some difficulty navigating, with his hard penis sticking out like it was.

As I walked him back to his bed and back under the covers, I went back into the en-suite, washed my hands, and then saying goodnight, I turned his light back off and made my way back to the nurses' station. Kathy was there waiting for me.

"Everything ok?" She said, looking up from her paperwork.

"Yes, I had to help Bob; he needed to use the toilet."

"You didn't fall for the rigid hands routine did you?" said Kathy with a half-smile on her face. "He does that to all the new girls, there's nothing wrong with his hands, he just gets turned on with young girls like you seeing him use the toilet and then getting you to wipe his bum."

The dawning of me being taken in like that gave me conflicting emotions, anger, but amusement at how wily an old devil he was. I guess being stuck in a care home can't be much fun, he's obviously found ways to get his enjoyment, and at the expense of unsuspecting and naive new helpers like me.

My next shift, three days later was pretty uneventful, Mrs Llewellyn had lost her teeth again, so a full-scale hunt was made (eventually being found in a plant pot, keeping company with a hearing aid and a poinsettia). And then Doreen insisted she needed help with her food, so I cut it all up for her into small bite-sized pieces, only for her to say that she wasn't hungry after all.

As I did my rounds of the bedrooms in the afternoon (some of the residents preferred to relax in their own bedrooms rather than in the communal areas), I popped my head around Reg's door. He was sitting in his chair, his eyes lit up when he saw me and he beckoned me in. Putting down his photography magazine, it looked as though he wanted a chat.

I'm not a qualified carer, so part of my duties when I was taken on, was simply to chat with the residents whenever possible.

As Reg welcomed me into his room and with me sitting on the chair next to his, we chatted.

"You do like your photography don't you," I said, indicating the collection of magazines next to his chair and dotted around his room.

"It's a new hobby for me, Emily, I've only in the past few months been getting into it", he said, as with a little difficulty he raised himself out of his chair and with the aid of his walking stick, hobbled to his dresser. Opening the drawer, he brought out a brand-new digital camera. He sat back down, his eyes sparkling with enthusiasm.

"This is my baby, I bought it just before I came in here, I still haven't had a chance to use it properly yet," he said as he handed his prized possession over to me. Not being into cameras myself, my phone has a camera, that's good enough for me, I honestly didn't know what any of the buttons or dials were. But Reg was obviously thrilled and excited by it.

"So what's stopping you from using it," I said.

"Well several things, firstly I don't yet have a computer to download all the photos I will be able to take with it," he said, "And secondly being stuck in here, I haven't as yet had any opportunity to use it."

I could see the passion in his eyes, even at 87 he seemed to have a sparkle, even if these were his last years, this newfound passion of photography for him seemed to give him something that nothing else could. It was lovely to see someone so enthused and excited, and at such an age too.

We had a lovely chat; he was so interesting and nice to talk with. He opened a few of his magazines, showing me the newest cameras, techniques and the things you could do with such a camera.

"These are the future Emily, with a digital camera you can take hundreds, if not thousands of photos and they will all be on this little chip thing," he said holding up the little memory card. "I don't have a computer yet, but when I do, I will be able to put all my photos on there."

Realising I'd spent the better part of half an hour with Reg, although enjoying every second, as graciously as I could, I left him still poring over his magazines and made my way further along the corridor.

As I passed Bob's room, he called out to me. I backtracked a few paces and looked in. He was sitting up in his bed watching TV.

"You couldn't give me a hand for a second could you?" He said, and I think he could see the look in my eye that told him that I wasn't going to get tricked into another bathroom visit like the last time.

"No, no," he said, "I just wondered if you could make this bed a little bit more comfortable, the sheets seemed to have become untucked."

I could sort of see what he meant, as I stood next to his bed, the sides had both come out and did look uncomfortable and rucked up.

"Ok let's see what I can do," I said as I tried to straighten and arrange things better for him.

As I leaned over him, trying my best to get his bedding sorted, in a flash he had his hand under the hem of my uniform and was groping my bum.

"What on earth do you think you're doing," I said standing up and pushing his hand away. "You can't do that, that's naughty." I felt like I was talking to a naughty child. He didn't say anything but had that naughty boy look on his face, a look that said he'd just been caught with his hand in the biscuit tin and had received a telling-off from an adult, even though he was 70-something years older than me.

"Sorry," he said, as he looked down with a guilty expression on his face.

"Ok, we'll let it go this time," I said, and with that, I carried on getting his bedding straight.

As I was almost finished and without any further incident, my defences were back down, when he took his next opportunity. The earlier grope was obviously a fact-finding mission, finding out the lay of the land, so to speak, because when I was least expecting it, there was his hand again but this time he was so fast and had zeroed in so adeptly at his target that before I even knew his hand was there, it was again up inside my uniform and this time his fingers were past the elasticated barriers and his fingers were briefly inside my panties.

"Hey!" I screamed out, "That's it," I said as I jerked myself back up and into a standing position next to the bed, "that really wasn't very nice at all; you should be ashamed of yourself." I was so angry.

"That felt nice," he said with a half-smile on his face "you've got a little hairy one".

I could feel my face flushed with anger at this naughty old man, his audacity and his barefaced inappropriate behaviour. If he wasn't so elderly, I would have slapped his face, but at 93 a slap across his cheek might have been fatal, either that or it would have sent his false teeth flying across the room. I was so angry though.

"You can unruffle your own sheets in future," I said as I made my way out of his room, so annoyed at this old man groping me like that and looking so pleased with himself too.

When I got back to the carers' staffroom later, I told Anne about it.

"Yes that's Bob, I'm surprised he hasn't done that to you before now, he's done it to all of us at some point, you've got to be on your toes with Bob. The next time you're in his room at night, and you get an opportunity when he's not looking, hide his teeth. He goes off alarming if he can't find his teeth." And we both laughed.

Two weeks later, I was informed that Reg was being discharged, his knee replacement surgery and recovery had gone so well, that he could now go back home. It was suggested however that one of us volunteers might like to volunteer to make regular visits for the first few weeks of his return home, just to make sure everything was going ok and assess whether he could cope on his own again.

Having got to very much like Reg, in the short time I had been helping out, I volunteered for the home visits. When we told Reg, as we were preparing him for his departure, he seemed very pleased.

"It would be an honour to have you visit my humble abode," he so charmingly said, and as he was helped onto the ambulance to be taken back home, along with his suitcase and collection of photography magazines, I told him I would call on him the following day.

I cycled to Reg's house the morning following his departure from the care home, it was a sunny day and the ride was incredibly refreshing and invigorating.

Reg lived in a small farmhouse, about 5 miles out of town. There were no neighbours in the immediate vicinity, in fact looking across the fields surrounding his house, I couldn't see another house. It was incredibly quiet and peaceful; I could see why he was so keen to get back home.

Reg had, some years before, installed a stair lift, due to his increasing knee problems, so getting upstairs to his bedroom wasn't a problem. There was also a bathroom downstairs as well as one upstairs, so that made life a lot easier for him too.

I arrived mid-morning and after knocking on Reg's front door it took some while before he came to the door, but on seeing me standing there his face lit up and he welcomed me inside.

"I'm so sorry for the delay," he said "I'm still struggling to walk very fast, even with this stick I can't seem to get around very well."

"It's no problem," I said, but Reg had already thought of a solution.

"When you leave, take my spare key with you, then you can just let yourself in whenever you come to visit and you won't have to wait around for this old man to answer the door in future."

He was such a sweet man, he did make me smile, and his 87 years belied his general demeanour. He did seem somewhat sad about his advancing years and his increasingly poor health and in our long discussions; several times it became clear that he thought maybe the end was getting near. I would always nip those thoughts in the bud however and try and get him to think positive fun thoughts. I wanted to do anything I could to get him to enjoy this last part of his life.

And one of those positive aspects of his life right now was certainly his newfound love of photography. Each time I visited he would get out one of his magazines and show me an article about landscape photography or a review of a new camera. He was genuinely enthused when chatting with me about what he would do and the photos he would be taking when he was back to full health.