Nevertheless, her daughters and my father thought it was best for her to be close to

Nevertheless, her daughters and my father thought it was best for her to be close to
Being Mortal Medicine and What Matters in the End
by Atul Gawande
Did you read Alice Hobson’s story as an inspiring one, or as a cautionary tale? How did
the rest of the course materials influence your response to this question?
-Be sure you use 4 new references in addition to the book.
-New Roman, Double Spaced, and 12 font size
I wrote one page of this assignment (1 reference)and my answer is that I see Alice’s story as an inpsiring one, below is my work so far and my request is for you to add 1-2 pages more with 4 references.
Towards the beginning of Alice Hobson’s story I thought I was reading a cautionary tale.
However, after I read more and after hearing the end of her story, I believe it to be an inspiring
tale. Although she was moved to a nursing home called Longwood House towards the last two
years of her life, Alice independently lived and enjoyed many beautiful years in her own home
even up to the age of eighty-four. She was able to keep driving, do her own shopping, and keep
her home set up to her taste for all those years. She also went to the gym with a friend.
I, personally, aspire to be able to go to the gym to do some form of physical activity and to
socialize at that age. Studies show that the remaining physically active as an older person has
shown to improve mental health, reduces the likeness of developing dementia, and improves the
overall quality of a person’s life (Langhammer et al., 2018). As we read, after Alice turned
eighty-four there was a change to her health and she was starting to fall. She also had an
occasion when she unknowingly ended up in the wrong cabin while on vacation with her family.
Alice was seen by a doctor and he found natural signs of aging like losing her memory and her
bones were thinning. He did some changes to her medication but was unable to really help Alice.
This doctor was not able to recommend a way for Alice to stay safe while keeping her
independence and quality of life. He is not the only one that is unable to give advice on the
matter and this is due to the fact that our society as a whole avoids talking about this final stage
in one’s life (Gawande, 2015). Although Alice was eventually admitted to a nursing home for the
last two years of her life, she lived an independent life just as she desired for the majority of her
life independent from family and from caretakers. My grandmother who is eighty-three years old
lives in a senior apartment complex and also has her home set up to her liking. She has a daily
routine and socializes with her friends in the lounge area of her building. There is a market
downstairs of her apartment complex that carries mostly everything that she needs to prepare her
meals and have a balanced diet. Nevertheless, as of the last few weeks, my grandma’s health has
started to decline and she also fell earlier this month. My mother and her sisters are working
together to see what is the next step for their mother, but from my observations and
conversations with my grandma I know that she has enjoyed her independence and her
community. On the other hand, my other grandmother who is eighty-nine years old has lived
with her daughter, grandchildren, and other tenants since her early sixties and has had to deal
with the family dynamics of their house. She does not complain but from our conversations, I
know that if it were up to her she would live in her own house in the countryside with less people
in the house. Nevertheless, her daughters and my father thought it was best for her to be close to
them without really asking how she felt or desired. Alice Hobson did not want to be nannied or
to be controlled(Gawande, 2015) the same way Harry Truman even in the midst of an erupting
volcano did not want to leave his home on Spirit Lake because that home was his life (Gawande,
2015). Whether we are twenty, thirty, fifty, or eighty years old, we all want to play by our own
rules, live a life of our own, and have a purpose and this is something that is not prioritized for
elder people especially in the United States.