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Recently while watching the local government channel, a segment on Meals on Wheels aired. This is one of the greatest programs for the elderly that is out there.
Before I had to quit my job, I started staying with my mother full time. She began to lose weight rapidly. I was taking her for her doctor appointments. However, all she would eat was a boiled egg and a tomato every day at lunch.
I contacted Meals on Wheels and they put her on a waiting list so she was on the program very soon. Every day she was brought a hot meal, newspaper and someone was in the house to check on her; I was home by 2 p.m.
As her dementia advanced and she could no longer feed herself, I took those meals brought to her and placed them in a food processor, pureed the food and spoon-fed her. The day she had the last meal, she had turnip greens, black-eyed peas, a pork chop, corn bread, peach cobbler and milk.
This was the last meal and she ate it all because of Meals on Wheels. She not only continued to stay in her home, but was able to die in the home she so loved.
There are many programs out there for which funding is being cut, but feeding the elderly is not one of the programs that federal funding needs to take a back seat to. Elderly people go to bed hungry every night because they can no longer prepare their food and feed themselves. The numbers are staggering.
If there is a senator or congressman out there who reads this letter, and funding of federal programs like Meals on Wheels is on the table to be cut, please vote "no." Elderly people have to be protected just like children.
WIC program is out there for women and children. Meals on Wheels is just a little drop of food for a hungry senior citizen, and sometimes caregivers have to feed them.
Carolyn Freeman
Flowery Branch