By Prof. Chiwuike Uba, PhD
There is a stage in life when the noise gradually reduces. The children have left home, careers have slowed down, friends have become fewer, and suddenly the house that once felt too small becomes suspiciously large. The same house that once struggled to contain children, visitors, noise and endless requests for money can eventually become so quiet that you begin to hear the refrigerator thinking.
Then comes an uncomfortable truth: loneliness can be one of the hidden costs of growing old.
We spend decades raising children to become independent, then act surprised when they actually become independent. We tell them, “Go and make something of yourself.” They obey us brilliantly. Abuja. Lagos. London. Toronto. America. Australia. Anywhere Google Maps can locate and immigration will permit.
Then, ten or twenty years later, we ask, “Why don’t these children visit?”
My brother, did we not train them to fly?
Sometimes, however, let us not blame the children too quickly. Some parents practically exported their children themselves. We paid the school fees, arranged the admission, bought the tickets, packed their bags and proudly waved them goodbye.
“Go abroad and make us proud!”
And they did.
Sometimes, it was genuinely about giving them a better education and a better life. Beautiful. Noble. Sensible.
But sometimes, let us confess, there was also a little social competition hiding inside the ambition.
“My son is in London.”
“My daughter is in Toronto.”
“All my children are in America.”
Suddenly, raising children became an international status competition. Your child graduated from UNN? Wonderful. Somebody else’s child graduated from Manchester? Please, make way. International parenting has entered the room.
But there is a tiny complication with exporting children.
They may actually settle where you sent them.
They get jobs. They marry. They have children. They buy houses. They acquire mortgages, school fees, careers and problems of their own. Eventually, the child you proudly sent abroad has built a whole life abroad.
Then we ask, “Why doesn’t he come home?”
Come home from where?
You bought the ticket!
Of course, children have responsibilities. Life is expensive, demanding and unforgiving. Some are genuinely constrained by distance, work, immigration rules, finances and their own families. A child in London cannot simply teleport to Enugu because Mama sneezed.
But there is a difference between being independent and becoming emotionally absent.
A phone call is not a mortgage. A visit is not a financial burden. Sometimes, an elderly parent does not need money, medicine or another generator. They simply need someone to sit beside them and ask, “Mummy, how are you?”
Because money is not presence.
A child can send money every month, pay hospital bills and renovate the family house and still be emotionally distant. Another may not have much money but calls regularly, visits whenever possible and knows exactly how Daddy likes his tea.
Can ₦500,000 enter a bank account and somehow sit beside Mama at dinner?
Can a bank transfer laugh at Daddy’s jokes?
Can an ATM withdrawal hold someone’s hand when the night suddenly feels too long?
Of course not.
And parents also need to confront another uncomfortable reality.
Children are not retirement plans.
We should not spend our entire productive lives saying, “My children will take care of me.”
They have spouses. They have children. They have careers. They have mortgages. They have school fees. Some are thousands of kilometres away.
Raising five children and expecting all five to become your retirement strategy is not exactly a robust pension architecture.
That is diversification of dependency.
We need to plan differently.
Retirement planning should not stop at pensions, investments, houses and medical insurance. We should also plan for companionship.
Who will I talk to?
Who will check on me?
Where will I live?
What happens if I can no longer drive?
Who helps me if I become dependent?
Who makes decisions if I can no longer make them?
What kind of care would I want?
These are not depressing questions. They are adult questions.
And loneliness does not check your bank balance before visiting.
A person can live in a magnificent mansion, own three cars, have domestic staff and money in several accounts and still eat dinner alone every evening.
Meanwhile, somebody living in a modest neighbourhood may have three friends knocking on the door every afternoon.
“We are just passing.”
Passing?
They have been passing every day for six years.
That is community.
A mansion can provide space. It cannot necessarily provide companionship.
Perhaps this is why we need to rethink ageing itself.
Retirement should not mean social retirement. Growing old should not automatically translate into sitting alone in a large house, watching television while waiting for somebody to remember that you exist.
The extended family that once provided an automatic safety net is gradually becoming a WhatsApp group with 247 members, 19 people reading messages, seven people typing “Amen” and only three actually responding.
Maybe communities of older people, shared homes, friendship networks and intentional companionship will become increasingly important. Friends and old colleagues could live close to one another, share certain facilities and grow old together.
Imagine six old friends saying:
“We have survived university, marriage, children, Nigerian electricity, fuel scarcity, politicians and family WhatsApp groups. Let us at least grow old together.”
Honestly, that may be more sensible than living alone in a six-bedroom mansion with three generators and nobody to argue with about the television remote.
And then there is our peculiar relationship with death.
While people are alive, everybody is busy.
When they die, suddenly everybody has time.
Someone who has not visited Mama in three years will announce, “Please, don’t bury her until I arrive.”
Arrive from where?
Jupiter?
You had three years to visit the living, but now the dead must wait for your flight schedule.
Then Nigerian funeral machinery kicks in.
Asoebi.
Canopies.
Caterers.
Photographers.
Committees.
Choirs.
Programmes.
Facebook tributes.
Someone will inevitably declare, “We must give Mama a befitting burial.”
Wonderful.
But perhaps we should ask a more uncomfortable question:
Did we give Mama a befitting life?
Can a magnificent casket compensate for years of loneliness?
Can a choir sing away neglect?
Can 2,000 mourners replace the one child who should have called every Sunday?
Can expensive food at a funeral compensate for the meals we never shared while the person was alive?
A magnificent funeral cannot retroactively become a magnificent relationship.
There is something deeply tragic about giving someone an elaborate farewell after giving them an ordinary life of neglect.
Sometimes, people wait until the obituary before expressing feelings they should have expressed while the person could still hear them.
“Daddy was my hero.”
Really?
Did Daddy know?
“Mummy was everything to me.”
Beautiful.
Did Mummy ever hear you say it?
“Words cannot describe how much I loved her.”
Unfortunately, words are now all you have.
Perhaps we should adopt a simple rule:
Visit before the obituary.
Call before the condolence message.
Hug before the funeral.
Say “I love you” before the tribute.
Sit down and listen to the same old story for the 38th time. One day, you may desperately wish you could hear that boring story again.
Growing old is inevitable.
Growing old alone should not be treated as inevitable.
Parents should prepare financially, socially, emotionally and practically. Children should remain connected, even when oceans separate them. Families should stop measuring love exclusively in money. And communities should become stronger so that ageing does not automatically become an exercise in isolation.
Because the real question is not simply:
“Who will bury me?”
It is:
“Who will still be around me when there is nothing left to gain from me?”
Who will call when I am no longer paying school fees?
Who will visit when I am no longer hosting Christmas?
Who will sit with me when I can no longer solve anybody’s problem?
Who will remember my birthday without Facebook reminding them?
That is where genuine relationships reveal themselves.
So, yes, plan your finances.
Plan your healthcare.
Plan your housing.
Plan your retirement.
But please, plan your people too.
Build friendships. Maintain relationships. Stay connected. Create community. Visit people while they can still open the door. Call them while they can still answer. Hug them while they are still standing.
Because the greatest inheritance is not always property, money or a beautifully designed obituary.
Sometimes, it is simply people.
People who know your stories.
People who laugh with you.
People who notice when you go quiet.
People who knock on your door because they have not seen you today.
People who will miss your presence, not merely attend your funeral.
Perhaps that is the real meaning of a befitting life.
Not how magnificent your funeral becomes after you die, but how meaningful your relationships were while you were alive.
Do not wait for the funeral to discover that you had hundreds of mourners but very few companions.
Live in such a way that, long before your obituary appears, people can genuinely say:
“I am glad this person is still here.”
That is a legacy worth planning for.