Two things caught my eye in the news this week. One was a story sent to me by a reader that told the heartbreaking story of a couple of nursing home residents that were separated by the man’s family because they were caught by the gentleman’s son in an indelicate situation. The fellow’s son was apparently concerned that his inheritance was at risk, so he moved his father to another facility. The lady in question had been diagnosed with dementia. She had, for some months, been deteriorating under institutional care. When the romance began, she started to dress, groom and socialize like she was starting a new romance! Upon being separated from her suitor, she fell into a depression, lost weight and stopped bathing and changing her clothes again.
The supervising judge of the probate court here in LA County has told me “With good cause, I can take away all of someone’s rights except to marry and write a will.” Our right to choose an intimate partner is that basic a freedom. It is the last thing to go. But with rights comes responsibility.
The other story was a news release from a VA/ Stanford researcher who announced that it is cost effective to do routine HIV testing on sexually active older adults. Cost effective means it adds quality of life years to an infected person’s life if an early diagnosis is made, and treatment begun. Another way to state it is a $10 test can add six months of life. About 20% of new HIV cases are older than 50 and about half are undiagnosed. As much as younger people may want to pretend that older adults are no longer interested in sex, the evidence suggests that older adults can enjoy a healthy love life well into seniority.
My favorite quote was from the doctor treating the lady in the first story. "If you've made it to age 95, I'm sorry, but having sex is not going to kill you—it's going to prolong your life.”