The people who know her are standing up
The neighbours, friends and regular caregivers who have known Trudy for years are rallying. They know how she lived — independently, lucid, surrounded by care — and they want her back where she belongs.
Something hopeful is happening around Trudy. The people who truly know her — her neighbours, her friends, her regular informal caregivers and care workers — are making their voices heard.
They know who Trudy is
These are not the people who assessed her once, in a single conversation. These are the people who have known her for years, some for decades. Who saw her several times a week in recent months. Who came into her home, chatted with her about her children and grandchildren, and saw with their own eyes how she lived her life: independently, lucid, and in the middle of her own familiar surroundings.
They know that Trudy lived in her own home with daily support. They know that she still did her own shopping, that she was aware of what was going on around her, and that — with the usual discomforts of her age and her COPD — she had her life in order.
The help that keeps her at home
What “daily support” means in practice is this: her son and grandson come by and do the work she can no longer manage because of her COPD and her age. The yard work, the pruning, the jobs in and around the house — tasks she used to do herself, now taken over by her family. It is precisely this help that makes it possible for her to keep living happily and comfortably in her own home.
And there was more. Alongside her family’s help, her son had arranged — on his own initiative and at his own expense — a dedicated caregiver. This trusted helper had come several times a week for more than three years: for the household, for fresh meals from the local organic butcher, but above all as a familiar, listening presence in Trudy’s own home. She accompanied Trudy to doctor’s appointments and knew Trudy — her health, her daily life, her wishes — better than anyone else in her circle of care. Trudy has grown deeply fond of her.
This was not a woman without care. This was a woman whose care had been arranged with love and at her family’s own expense, precisely so that she could keep living at home.
A community standing up
Now that Trudy has been taken away against her will and cut off from everyone, that community is not staying silent. Neighbours, friends and caregivers are, of their own accord, providing dated, signed statements about how they experienced Trudy. They are doing this because they know that the picture which led to her forced admission does not match the woman they saw every day.
These statements are being gathered and handed to the lawyer, in preparation for the court hearing. They are the voices of people who want nothing more than to tell the truth about someone they love.
Where she belongs
Trudy is 82 and turns 83 this month. She has made clear what she wants: to return to her own home, in her own street, among the people who know and care about her — to live out the rest of her life in dignity and peace, with the care she needs and which her family is willing to arrange at its own expense.
That is not an unreasonable wish. It is exactly what any person is entitled to. And the people around her are determined to help her make it real.
This post will be updated as more becomes known.