The objective of this Christmas: that no older person spend it alone

[Inkriql]

Paquita is one of the more than two million people over 65 who live alone in Spain (data from the INE Continuous Household Survey of 2018). She is also the protagonist of the "Inflatable families" campaign, which the NGO Great Friends has designed to raise awareness in society about the problem of loneliness in the elderly. The goal of it is to prevent women and men of the elderly from being alone during this Christmas.

This initiative is added to many others driven by regional and local administrations, associations, NGOs, and other entities that seek to alleviate the problem of loneliness that affects these people throughout the year, and that by this time reaches one of its highest annual peaks.
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There are many ways to face this reality and not become the campaign Paquita. The family is the closest support. Friends and neighbors are also a good reference. Doing activities outside the home, signing up for courses and not locking yourself up at home is something that all experts recommend. Searching for associations that have accompaniment plans and other actions also serve to weave a new network of friendships to rely on at all times of the year, not just this one.
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"Christmas is a time I have been a little bad," says Josefa, 88. She has been a widow for 24. She lives alone in the Madrid town of Móstoles. He has two children and four grandchildren. They call her every day and they will eat with her often. Not everything she wanted, "but life is set up like this, they live in Madrid, they have their life, their work, and the youth of now is more independent than before," he says.

You will spend the most important days of these parties with each of your two children. For the rest of the conference, it has the weekly visit of a Great Friends NGO volunteer and also attends the snacks organized by this entity once a month. One is not lost. There he is making new friends. "Older people need love and the NGO gives it to us," he says.

Inés also comes to these monthly snacks Inés, a 75-year-old widow who lives in Vigo and who moves with difficulty due to the consequences that a stroke left him 10 years ago. She does it accompanied by Rebeca, a volunteer from the same organization, with whom she is delighted. "It's wonderful," he adds. She has never liked Christmas much, much less since her husband died. He will spend it with his son, “who is commercial, travels a lot and does not see everything he wants,” his two sisters and will be visited by his grandchildren, of whom he feels “very proud”.

Grandes Amigos will organize events throughout these days Christmas parties in all locations where it is present (Madrid, Galicia and the Basque Country). In collaboration with other companies, and among other actions, they will also do Christmas decorations and carol workshops, bus visits to see the lights and delivery of gifts to people with mobility problems who cannot go to the parties.

There are more initiatives to spend these days together and not feel lonely. In the residences, where more than 360,000 elderly people live (data from 2017 of the CSIC) also prepare to develop a series of different activities.

This is the case of the Santa Lucia Foundation Senior Residence in Moratalaz, managed by Cáritas Madrid, and in which 70 people, 19 men and 51 women live with an average age of 86.5 years. One day a week and until January they receive, among others, the visit of the Magi or volunteer children of schools "We make special meals", says its director, Rosario Gonzalo. There are few residents who come to collect their relatives. There are also some who have no one. “We are a family and this is their home,” says Gonzalo. Antonia Díez, 85, is a recent member of this family. He came to the residence only 14 months ago because "he cried every day and had a depression," he confesses. "Loneliness has been very bad for me," says this woman who was widowed 14 years ago and now feels happy in a place where they "love and pamper her" according to her words. It is one of those few that will come to pick up his family. They will do their nieces, with which they will spend on December 25 and January 1. They also help her the rest of the year. “They have their family, their work, their mother-in-law, who are also widows, etc. You can't ask for more, ”he concludes.