Abstract
ABSTRACT Purpose: This study aimed to explain and understand the existential meaning of the finality of life from the perspective of healthy older adults. Method: Participants were recruited from a major project on older adults’ life situations. They were interviewed about their thoughts on the end of life, and their responses were interpreted using a lifeworld hermeneutic approach. Results: The findings showed that thinking about the inevitable finality of life involves feelings of liberation, frightening thoughts, a comforting promise of something beyond death, acceptance of the concept of death as a companion in life and a desire to live. Philosopher Simone de Beauvoir’s existential ideas about ageing and death were then used to further explain and understand the meaning of the finality of life and to support a comprehensive understanding. de Beauvoir suggests that when the temporal horizon of existence shrinks, one lives closer to the finality of life. For a comprehensive understanding, attributing meaning to the finality of life required the intertwining of reconciliation and displacement. The interpretations were further discussed using ideas from the fields of existential philosophy and caring science in order to develop a basis for caring practice. Conclusions: The conclusions suggested that professional health care for older adults would benefit from a lifeworld-led caring science approach that includes readiness for a caring dialogue that focuses on existential issues.
Highlights
The ageing process varies in terms of health and wellbeing, but most older adults in the Western world can look forward to increased life expectancy
The interpreted themes suggest that the finality of life can be under stood as a liberation, a frightening thought, a comforting promise of something beyond death, acceptance of the concept of death as a companion in life and a desire to live
Awareness of the finality of life means living in an ambiguity whereby death is the final horizon of life
Summary
The ageing process varies in terms of health and wellbeing, but most older adults in the Western world can look forward to increased life expectancy. Research on later life covers two main areas One of these concerns biological ageing with an increased risk of ill health and impaired functions (Kontos, 1999; Lennartsson et al, 2014), while the other relates to social and existential matters. The latter involves investigations of life without a professional identity (Dalheim-Englund et al, 2018; Gynnerstedt, 2011; Nordenfeldt, 2003) and the final part of life when the need for support and help is evident (see for example Mitzner et al, 2009). One acknowledges the finality of life by being part of a generation that successively disappears (se for example Dalheim-Englund et al, 2018; Palmér et al, 2018)
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