My Mother's Hunger Strike, Month Four

My Mom is on a hunger strike in her nursing home. I'm not convinced she would agree with that statement per se. But she's not eating, hardly anything, she's rapidly losing weight, her kids are very concerned, and so is her doctor.

Let me lay out the scenario at Mashpee Rehab and Care for you. The building is about 40 years old, is pretty well cared-for (though it's got one of the darkest, least welcoming lobbies I've ever seen), the lawn is mowed, the hallways are clean.

The staff is thin on the ground—not by their choice but by corporate choice. Remember, the whole reason to house older people and folks needing rehab is to make money.

So if you need help eating because you're hands are weak or they shake so bad you can't manipulate eating utensils (like my Mom), forget it. At mealtime, the staff has little time to do more than deposit food (and I use that word with caution) on a wheeled hospital table then move on to the next resident.

I've been listening to my mother complain and complain and complain about the food at Mashpee Rehab for months and I have to admit, much of what she said kind of sailed right over me because my Mom is a renowned picky eater. But now she sends most of her meal trays away untouched. She says that just the smell rising from the plate makes her gag.

My sister agrees that the quality has been going downhill for a while but she didn't think it was as bad as Mom claimed. But now Mom's health is being compromised because she won't eat what she calls "their garbage." So I went to see for myself.

My Mom was not kidding, at all, not one bit.

See that picture at the top of this post? Breakfast. Waffles (straight from the freezer to a plate near you) that are so soft, they cannot be cut with the plastic (yep, plastic, how's that for waste?) utensils provided with every meal. No butter on the waffle (which wouldn't have melted anyway because it was stone cold) and syrup that my Mom cannot open.

Then there's the cereal. Carbohydrates on top of carbohydrates.

Then of course there's the toast. Hmmm, three carbs? Are we loading up for running a marathon or are we just cheap? The toast, white bread with no known nutritional value, is dry.

OK, let's say it all together—Yummy!!!

Now the other tray full of food (?) is supper. See that light brown circular thing toward the bottom of the picture? That is half of a frozen, fried, breaded, thin-as-a-dime chicken patty on a dry roll. No lettuce, no tomato, no mayo.

And if you watched the shows about Jamie Oliver trying to get good food into the schools of America, you know what chicken patties are made of—the leavings, the scraps, the guts and the bones left over after you take away everything that can be sold for a higher price.

See that little, covered plastic cup? That's mustard—for the chicken patty I presume, but who knows.

Then there's the veggie side dish, chopped cucumber. I touched it after I took this picture because I was sure the cuke was old. It was, as I suspected, slimy to the touch.

And then, of course, there's the dry roll over on the side to go with the dry roll that the dry chicken patty is sitting on.

And for dessert, oooooh it's everyone's favorite, synthetic-tasting pudding that honestly would have had no flavor at all if it wasn't for the powdered milk in it. When I asked my Mom if she knew what it was supposed to be, she said she had been told it was lemon.

Right.

So Mom's not eating anything they put on a tray and bring to her room. She's living on what my sister brings in. We're paying taxes for Medicare and Medicaid, both of which my mother depends on, for facilities that are understaffed, where good food has absolutely no place on the corporate bottom line, and where helpless people are used for the profit they make for others.

Now I ask you, what economic sense does it make to put crap on a tray that no one will eat so it can be thrown away instead of investing in good food in small portions (older people are not renowned for their huge appetites) that would help folks stay healthy?

Why, perfect economic sense if you're the owner of a nursing-care facility that gets a lot of federal money because—wait for it—you make more money on sick people. All those pills, the reimbursement on them means more for the corporate bottom line.

The corporation that owns Mashpee Rehab, by the way, is Sunbridge Healthcare in New Mexico. Not that I think putting their name here matters to them a whit. Shame isn't in the budget.