Why I was Banned by Inconsideration from Shopping Centres at the age of 71 years

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Why I was Banned by Inconsideration from Shopping Centres at the age of 71 years

Australia: Governments Bully Force Elderly Citizens to shop weekly when COVID-19 Threatens to kill all Pensioners over 70 Years. Here’s why?

After eight years of delays I finally after a spinal check got the medical approval to have my knee replacement scheduled… the reason for all the delays was caused by a history of Warfarin Care, fifty percent risk of death and finally cancer. Now I have the approval… no I don’t. Elective Surgery has been cancelled because of COVID-19… now I must stay crippled.

Recently Prime Minister Scott Morrison issued a statement telling all Pensioners 70 years old and over, not to leave home and avoid Shopping Locations to protect themselves from the Coronavirus.

Actually the age should have been 60 years old, because every person over sixty years is very vulnerable to infection by COVID-19. Many younger people have caught Coronavirus suffered and some have died.

As Pensioners to save money on petrol, since 2012, we only shopped once every three to four weeks and except for perishables, most supplies we always bought in quantities of 6 to 10 bulk buying at discount prices wherever we could to save money during the year to reduce our cost of living. But all of this reorder point, inventory control stock rotation management fell apart when available quantity supplies were reduced to limits of one and two items only.

Toilet paper rolls has not been available to us since the beginning of March 2020.

Frozen vegetables, we can’t get any more than 2 packets after driving in 20 k’s and back home another 20 k’s. Once upon a time we could buy all of our different vegetable needs in one day per month. Now we have to drive in weekly just to get some vegetables, and other limited supply needs.

When we arrive often what we need is not available, so we drive home without the things we need and have to wait another week in the hope we find those things on the shelf that we need. But what the hell, we are not the only ones doing it hard, there are others worse off than us. This battle with COVID-19 is a war.

When the Prime Minister tells people 70 years and over to stay home, what he is doing is sentencing us to death, because without supplies we cannot survive. Thus we must with all of the Rationing go out weekly at the dangerous risk of being struck down by COVID-19 but hey that is what elderly people had to do in Europe during World War II at the risk of being shot or killed by bombs.

Now that we are having to shop weekly our petrol usage has doubled and our car is now pushing more Carbon Monoxide into the atmosphere increasing pollution.

We have to go to the petrol station more often facing the risk of CV contamination from the petrol pumps. The old days when I in my youth was a petrol attendant are over-its now self-serve. The risk of doing self-serve in supermarkets is now more dangerous of being infected than being served at a checkout counter.

In a crisis… Optimism and Hope is not worth much and inspires negativity that has too often killed people in war and peace, when hope seems lost. I only trust the cosmic philosophy of calm Positive Mental Attitude and persistent toughness of mind.

Coles and Woolworths did not launch this ban, they are innocent and did not persecute elderly people.

The culprits that banned elderly people like myself by inconsideration were the Managers of Shopping Mall Centres that is… Centre Management.

All wooden benches- long seats were either removed or crossed taped with yellow tape stopping people from sitting down to rest. Why? Because they did not want to pay the extra labour cost of more frequently cleaning the benches to stop the bacteria of virus from spreading.

Young healthy people don’t need to sit down whilst shopping. But elderly people must sit down and rest, some like myself more often than others. Thus elderly people can no longer do their shopping, it is physically too difficult and usually very painful to walk too long. I have seen many elderly people struggle to do their shopping in past decades even when I was younger and capable of walking not then needing to sit down.

Without those seats for resting period, elderly people are in danger of collapsing whilst walking, I am very vulnerable to that dangerous reality. If COVID-19 does not get me, exhaustion and crippling pain will. I have to pace it out… this is why and how I must cope…

I am 71 years old at the time of this writing in 2020, with a bad left leg, including ankle, knee and hip. I can only walk with Forearm Crutches- Canadian Anatomical with Ergonomic grips, since December 2010. I was denied a knee replacement operation, because I am on ‘blood thinner’ warfarin treatment. I was told by a specialist in 2012, that I had a more than 50% chance of not surviving an operation, hence the medical profession, two specialists and one GP, cancelled my planned knee operation, which was scheduled in early 2011 for surgery late 2012. Even my Dentist refused to pull a bad tooth, in 2014, because he said he could not stop the bleeding, so he resolved the problem by Root Canal procedure. I came near to death, close to end of January 2012, as a consequence of a second time, blood clot on the lungs. Old age singled me out. The injury of an accident, two broken legs, in October 1975 at 26 years and ten months, caught up with me in December 2010. In late November 1975, I suffered my first blood clot on the lungs and was given three hours to live. I survived because of my Positive Mental Attitude and toughness of mind. Now the reason I am telling you this background, is to deliver a message.

Why I cannot shop now without resting by sitting down at regular intervals. Pain has never worried me, and I have lived with excruciating pain since 1975 at the age of 26 years. Constant pain hits me in the left leg 24/7 even in my sleep, since October 1975. But I am a tough positive mental attitude person and I can endure any hardship forced upon me. But the law of physics won’t let me walk with a bad knee that has weakened over the years due to aging process.

Now in my 70^th to 71^st year 2020, I can only walk one hundred metres from the car to the shopping centre then I sit down for 15 minutes until my knee strengthens by rest. Usually my wife and I always plan first stop for rest at a café before proceeding with the painful job of shopping. Then I can walk around shopping centre, usually Coles or Woolworths for one hundred metres of walking before I have to leave the store and go and sit down for another 15 to 20 minutes. My 74-year-old wife continues the shopping because she can walk and stand longer than I can, but she cannot lift heavy things. I can lift heavy items into trolleys and into car by quickly standing for no more than three minutes on my right leg. When we arrive home, I load the heavy items onto a flat trolley and roll it into the house. Years ago I could walk and pack food and supplies very quickly into a Pantry, now it takes me 4-6 hours stop start because my left leg cannot stand the pace without a crutch. It very hard to do things with only one free hand.

I have always in my younger years since the 1975 accident been limited to a standing period of only 15 minutes before excruciating pain climbs up my left leg. Now I am limited to standing on the spot for only 3 minutes before that intense pain starts. If I stand too long like in a queue for checkout, I shall have difficulty in walking thereafter. I have to head straight for a bench to sit down lest I fall over on the spot. I am six foot three and no one except a weightlifter has the strength to pick me up. If I fall and I have many times at home and once in a shopping carpark, I have to crawl and drag myself towards some higher level to grab and pull myself up.

Back in 2016 when I was walking a bit better than I can now, I fell in a carpark fortunately near my car, I had a shopping trolly packed with supplies. My wife was not with me that day, though mostly we are together. I crawled towards my car and lifted myself up. My right arm around the wrist was covered in blood caused by warfarin care blood to stop blood clots on the lungs. I had ripped off the top layer of my skin 40mm x 50mm on my right arm, I had blood flowing everywhere because of my arms collision with the ground cement. I wrapped a clean handkerchief around my wrist. When I arrived home, I poured methylated spirits over the wound to kill the bacteria. Sure it stings but infection is worse. Then I bandaged it. It healed about 7 days later.

Self-pity is not in my thinking… to me all suffering and hardship is just another challenge and as the adage correctly says, “when the going gets tough, the tough get going.”

However, no matter how tough our mind is, the body can only physically do what it has the strength to do and that is the first thing we quickly loose as we reach our elderly years.

Centre Management is too lazy to care about the elderly, they have demonstrated they are an inconsiderate deadbeat team with no concern about anyone but themselves.

We can’t get home deliveries where we live in rural areas. Coles, Woolworths and Dan Murphy’s will not deliver and with all the current ration limits on quantities it is not cost effective for them to travel a distance of 20 k’s to do deliveries thus we oldies must drive in and do our own shopping. Problem is when we arrive, I cannot walk far, without sitting down.

Where are the benches and cafes for all elderly people? They have all been closed down by Centre Management and the Government.

Thus because Centre Management will not clean benches, elderly people cannot sit and rest.

Sad thing is that with all the current job losses, cleaning Benches, would give someone a job. Ah that would cost more money and Centre Management would reduce its bottom-line profit. We can’t allow that to happen, can we?

Those ride on carts that people drive around in shopping centres are alright if a person lives nearby. But they are too big to load into a car for transport. And too many ride on carts in shopping centres increases the risk of traffic congestion and collision with pedestrians.

Now we finally get to the other part of our problem as elderlies… Living the risk of COVID-19 or living the risk of dying without adequate supplies.

Even the Panadol pain killer that elderly people need daily is limited to a ration supply of one packet a fortnight. Pensioners have to go to the chemist fortnightly, lest they run out. Despite all my pain since 1975 I never started using painkillers like Endone and Panadol until both hospitals, first Grafton and then Lismore insisted when I was fighting Lymphoma Cancer in 2019 that I must take 6 tablets of Panadol a day, 2 every 8 hours. And one Endone during middle of night to reduce pain so that I could sleep. This was later enforced during Chemotherapy and in early 2020 during radiation process and MRI. In the case of Endone I was instructed to also take one during the day 20 minutes before I started Radiation Treatment.

I was taught by the Hospitals that prevention of intense pain was far wiser than enduring it. A Doctor once told me that energy loss is faster when we tough it out and endure pain.

Governments are over-zealous in their rules of enforcement. All the rules are designed for the young without any thought about the serious impact upon the elderly.

I once warned some troublesome youths in my early sixties… I said, “Be careful treat the elderly with respect, because we have lived our lives, you have not, we have nothing to lose by violently taking you out if you threaten us.” My message was clear, we elderly are not going to let aggressive young ones turn us into a vegetable.

We return to the circular beginning for another day almost just like 1993 Groundhog Day– the movie.