Malcolm Pointin

Despite being away we managed to watch the documentary about Barbara and Malcolm Pointin.( Malcolm and Barbara :Love's Farewell ) Shocked by all she had to do , how she managed to keep on doing everything for him for all those years whilst he became more and more difficult to manage . Particularly shocked by his aggression , and by how she seemed to manage not to retaliate when he made definite attacks on her pulling her hair hitting her squeezing her hands very hard and generally appearing to shove her and manhandle her . However much she knew this was not the "real Malcolm " whom she said had always been a very loving and gentle man , I still find myself wondering whether in her shoes and under extreme duress I might have snapped and attacked back with verbal violence or even actual physical hurting . You hope not , but ......
Incredible to think that he survived for so long and that she went in caring for him day after day , and by the looks of things with very little support . Knowing all the furore about whether Paul Wilson had actually filmed the moment of death , I found it hard to grasp what this was all about . There was enough there to exercise people about the tragedy of Alzheimers and what little help is there for those whose lives are affected . It seemed to me that Malcolm started dying well over ten years ago and that it was this ( process of )"dying" and "death" which interested Paul Wilson , rather than an attempt to film any one particular moment .