The title of a booklet caught my eye recently.  It read, “I’m old, not stupid – What older people think but don’t say.”

It describes itself as the ‘must read book’ for family members with elderly relatives.

The title pulled me up because it echoed my own irritation about the way many ‘younger’ people so often speak to and interact with older people.  As if older people (whatever age that is), despite their many decades and depth of experience on the planet, are somehow no longer normal, intelligent adults.

We see it in the way too many people in the caring professions speak to – or about – older people.  In the way they change the pitch in their voice and come over all jolly and paternalistic with their ‘Now don’t you worry yourself with any of that, Mr Smith, we’ll get you sorted in no time’, approach to communication.

And we see it in families too...

Read more here.