I don't think its all that bad. I know I'd rather have some company in an old folks home , food served , plus all the other perks that would far outweigh me living in my own home where I could no longer care for myself.

This all depends on how long I live of course and only Allah knows that.

Not an old folks home hippity.
A stinking death ward.

I have never actually been in a geriatric ward in any country but I have spent time in wards that smelled of urine so this thread brings back old memories I was kinda hoping were long gone.

I remember being in four bed rooms trying to get to sleep listening to the sound of other patients moaning in pain. Unfortunately I also remember getting my revenge one night and keeping them up with my own moaning.

She died of cancer, she died of a heart attack, she died of, fed up with causes,; she died.

LUCY

by: William Wordsworth (1770-1850)

I.

STRANGE fits of passion have I known:
And I will dare to tell,
But in the lover's ear alone,
What once to me befell.

When she I loved look'd every day
Fresh as a rose in June,
I to her cottage bent my way,
Beneath an evening moon.

Upon the moon I fix'd my eye,
All over the wide lea;
With quickening pace my horse drew nigh
Those paths so dear to me.

And now we reach'd the orchard-plot;
And, as we climb'd the hill,
The sinking moon to Lucy's cot
Came near and nearer still.

In one of those sweet dreams I slept,
Kind Nature's gentlest boon!
And all the while my eyes I kept
On the descending moon.

My horse moved on; hoof after hoof
He raised, and never stopp'd:
When down behind the cottage roof,
At once, the bright moon dropp'd.

What fond and wayward thoughts will slide
Into a lover's head!
'O mercy!' to myself I cried,
'If Lucy should be dead!'

II.

SHE dwelt among the untrodden ways
Beside the springs of Dove,
A Maid whom there were none to praise
And very few to love:

A violet by a mossy stone
Half hidden from the eye!
Fair as a star, when only one
Is shining in the sky.

She lived unknown, and few could know
When Lucy ceased to be;
But she is in her grave, and oh,
The difference to me!

III.

TRAVELL'D among unknown men,
In lands beyond the sea;
Nor, England! did I know till then
What love I bore to thee.

'Tis past, that melancholy dream!
Nor will I quit thy shore
A second time; for still I seem
To love thee more and more.

Among the mountains did I feel
The joy of my desire;
And she I cherish'd turn'd her wheel
Beside an English fire.

Thy mornings show'd, thy nights conceal'd,
The bowers where Lucy play'd;
And thine too is the last green field
That Lucy's eyes survey'd.

IV.

THREE years she grew in sun and shower;
Then Nature said, 'A lovelier flower
On earth was never sown;
This child I to myself will take;
She shall be mine, and I will make
A lady of my own.

'Myself will to my darling be
Both law and impulse; and with me
The girl, in rock and plain,
In earth and heaven, in glade and bower,
Shall feel an overseeing power
To kindle or restrain.

'She shall be sportive as the fawn
That wild with glee across the lawn
Or up the mountain springs;
And hers shall be the breathing balm,
And hers the silence and the calm
Of mute insensate things.

'The floating clouds their state shall lend
To her; for her the willow bend;
Nor shall she fail to see
Even in the motions of the storm
Grace that shall mould the maiden's form
By silent sympathy.

'The stars of midnight shall be dear
To her; and she shall lean her ear
In many a secret place
Where rivulets dance their wayward round,
And beauty born of murmuring sound
Shall pass into her face.

'And vital feelings of delight
Shall rear her form to stately height,
Her virgin bosom swell;
Such thoughts to Lucy I will give
While she and I together live
Here in this happy dell.'

Thus Nature spake -- The work was done --
How soon my Lucy's race was run!
She died, and left to me
This heath, this calm and quiet scene;
The memory of what has been,
And never more will be.

V.

SLUMBER did my spirit seal;
I had no human fears:
She seem'd a thing that could not feel
The touch of earthly years.

No motion has she now, no force;
She neither hears nor sees;
Roll'd round in earth's diurnal course,
With rocks, and stones, and trees.

^^^ as an aside to the above, a poor we girl telling me, my friend is better now, she went home last night, soon I can go home.
Poor girl, little did she know.

Words failed me, how do you reply.

Been on a cancer ward, nothing comes close to that with the possible exception of a terminal childrens ward ( never been on one of them ).

Been on a few geriatric wards and found them to be okay, nothing overly upsetting except the sight of old biddies not being visited at visiting hours. That was easily enough remedied as my Gran had too many visitors so the rest of us spread out talking to the unattended while waiting turn with my Gran.

It's called being human.

We are born to die,
such is life, such is life.
We are born out of love,
such is life, such is life.
We die for a reason,
but I'm still waiting for that.