FEHITOLA TOYIN OBILOMO, the chair of Caring Hands International, was in ecstatic mood. She moved her body in time with the music that played slowly in the background. Of course, she had every reason to be happy. She had another opportunity to do what she likes doing most: feting elderly people.
About 700 elderly people had converged in a hall, chatting, eating and making merry. They could barely hide their excitement. From the way they conducted themselves, even the blind would know that they were enjoying a kind of treatment they did not get often.
It was a scenario Obilomo had grown familiar with. “My dad was an auditor in the old Western Region. He died when he was just around 50. We grew up living with many people in our house. There were many people my parents were supporting. My parents had five biological children, but there was never a time the children in the house were fewer than 13. I grew up in an environment like that. We grew up to love,” she recalled.
Prior to the incorporation of Caring Hands International, she had engaged in helping the needy and the elderly. “At that time, we were not really sure of which category of people we should care for,” she said.
But all that changed with a dramatic encounter she had with an old man. “We were looking for a building and we went to Ayetoro (a part of Osogbo, Osun State capital) and saw some old buildings, one after the other. We looked at one and saw that there was space. We were told that the man who owned the building was living in the next compound.
“We met with him. His environment was tidy and comfortable. The house was well furnished and from the look of the place, we knew that the man was not a poor man. Later on, we got to know that the man was highly educated, judging from his spoken English.”
Luckily for Obilomo, the old man was receptive to her, as he was apparently looking for someone to talk with.
“After about 20 minutes, we did not see anybody around him. We then asked: ‘Baba, where is Mama (his wife)?’ But he said Mama had gone to meet with the Lord.’ It was something we had sensed might be, because Baba was around 90, if not a bit more.”
The task of taking care of the 90-year-old man had been placed in the hands of a woman. The old man’s children had employed the woman who took care of his breakfast, cleaned the house and made sure that the old man had his bath. From the way the environment looked that morning, the woman that took care of the old man had already visited.
For his dinner, the old man depended on those who hawked bread or eko (pap). Unfortunately, the old man found it difficult to get down from his one-storey building.
Though lonely, the 90-year-old man, according to Obilomo, found a way round his problem. Rather than remain at the mercy of anyone, the 90-year-old man got an empty paint bucket to which he tied a rope and lowered down from the balcony of his upper floor apartment. He would lower the paint bucket down with money in it and a hawker would put whatever food he desired in the bucket. And if there was a balance he wanted to collect, he would do so through the same process.
After listening to the story of the 90-year-old man, Obilomo became really touched. The children of the old man must be living with the belief that they were taking good care of the old man while nobody was monitoring the woman that was taking care of him.
Obilomo said: “We thought that if something like that could happen to an individual who was rich and comfortable, then something worse would happen to those who have nobody to care for them.
“We discovered that elderly people suffer from loneliness, and that is the major thing that kills them fast. It is sad that their children don’t have time for them. The loneliness is much more pronounced among the elderly people who have no offspring.
“That was when we decided to have a structure where we can take care of the elderly,”
The plight of the elderly became the genesis of Caring Hearts International. Fortunately, life itself had prepared Obilomo for this task. She had worked as a senior nurse and social worker. She takes care of the elderly by gathering them together every month to give them the necessary medical attention and offer legal and spiritual advice to them.
“We also have a counselling unit,” she said. “We call them (elderly people) and ask what is bothering them. Most of the time, we find that one of their children is having a problem or something. This is rampant among the women.”
She said it is not uncommon to see some of them embarking on long fasting, which affects their health. “They would tell you that their children had been married for so many years but had no issues. And they would keep on fasting and fasting. We always advise such a person.”
Many would not find the ways of aged people funny, but Obilomo says she has found a way of tolerating them, especially when they are suffering from dementia.
“Dementia is a situation where an individual starts losing memory. You see somebody who has just eaten, may be about 20 minutes ago shouting: ‘Won’t you give me food? I’ve not eaten for two days!’ It is a psychiatric problem. We bring in doctors, even psychiatric doctors, to come and talk on the issue. Even if it is nutrition problem, we bring in an expert in nutrition,” she said.
Besides assisting the elderly in the areas of health and nutrition, Obilomo also assists them in solving their legal challenges. “We have some old people who are rich and have assets. We invite legal experts to talk to them about Will,” she said.
But she said that all the programmes are being financed from her private pocket. She does not receive funding from any quarter.
“It is only the money contributed or sourced for by the board of trustees, and very few friends who believe in the vision,” she said.
So, where does she get energy to do the job? “I just believe it is a vision given to us. One thing is that even before we started the NGO, we had seen in our family that it is not difficult to help others.
“We believe in sharing; my husband is a reverend. An engineer by profession, he retired from PHCN as an executive officer. He is a reverend in ECWA Church. From the beginning when we got married, we saw that it was very easy for us to give out and assist people. So, it has not been a problem to us.
“If we have, we give, and that has sustained us. It has not been a case of I’m spending too much and I’ve not been receiving anything. We are not waiting to receive anything really. What makes us to continue the programme is that we look at the elderly ones and the way they appreciate what we are doing.”
Good as it may seem, Obilomo says that some of the elderly people do not appreciate what Caring Heart International is doing. But she said that has not stopped her from continuing the work.
“There are a few of them who feel it is their right. And the way they talk, it is as if they are paying for the services. But most of them pray for us and their prayers have been a source of encouragement for us. We’ve seen some programmes put on ground and nobody appreciates them. But because they appreciate them, that makes us to want to continue to do them.”
She also said that the funding of the programme chokes her organisation, but she is not discouraged by it. “We believe that God who has sustained the programme will continue to do so, although we wouldn’t mind others joining forces with us to sustain the programme. These people need a lot of assistance but we’ve only been able to do little as individuals.”
She admits that the attitude of some of the aged people could sometimes be discouraging, but she said that nothing would dissuade her from doing what she is doing.
“I don’t feel like quitting the care of the elderly because I believe that whatever we can do in our capacity we will do. But when there is nothing, there is nothing you can do about that. But those things we can do, we will do them as long as we have the source of funding.
“There is nothing anybody can say to me that will make me say I don’t want to do it again. I might be a bit discouraged by the way some of them talk, because there are some things some of them would say and I tell myself that these people were in their homes and I said I had a programme, I was the one who asked them to come. So, whatever happens, I must be able to overlook it.”
Happily, the task of taking care of the elderly has in no way affected the home front. She says she has found a way of balancing the two. She says she is lucky her children are grown up. In fact, one of them, who has a Master’s degree in Public Health from Sheffield in UK, is the programme co-coordinator.
She said: “It has never affected the home front. It is like the whole family is involved in it. It is a vision God gave the whole family; even all our children believe in the vision.”
The job is stressful, no doubt, considering her tight programme. But at 53, she looks healthy and radiant. Unknown to many, she hardly uses drugs. Asked about the secret of her good looks, she responded: “There is no secret. It is God’s grace. I’m one of the nurses. I don’t even believe in taking drugs. But when you see me take drugs, that means I’m really sick and I need to be out of here.
“When I was nursing kids, I wasn’t using drugs for my children. In fact, God has been faithful. It is not a matter of taking drugs. But I know that maybe if I have been using food supplement, I could have looked younger.”
She is retired and helping the elderly occupies a prime position on her mind. But out of her tight schedule, she takes time off to rest with a ‘sabbatical’ outside the country at least once a year.
She said: ”I have retired. I have all the time in this world to myself. If I don’t go out, I attend church activities. And when I’m at home, I watch the TV or lie down. I listen to music.
“We make sure we go out of the country at least once a year. It could be more than once in a year. We go to the US, the United Kingdom or Dubai (the United Arab Emirates), just me and my husband. It might just be for two weeks because we’ve seen that if we don’t go out of the country, we don’t rest.”
Obilomo would love to do more than she is doing for the elderly, but she says that getting enough funds has been a problem. She plans to run an old people’s home in the nearest future. “It will be a very conducive place,” she said.
She recalled that she once watched a programme on the TV about old peoples’ home, which really broke her heart. “An old peoples’ home is supposed to be run like a home. The person there will feel like, ‘I’m not in my house but I’m in a house.’ It is a place where they will have amenities at their beck and call,” she said.
She says the kind of home she is planning will have visiting doctors, physiotherapists and cooks, attending to the needs of elderly people.
