A startling number of older Americans fall at home with no one to help them. Such was the case of an 82-year-old living in Clyde, North Carolina, who, according to the newspaper The Mountaineer, took a tumble in her bathtub on June 1 and didn’t get help back up until June 10.
Joan Rivet spent nine days trapped in her bathtub, and the only reason she managed to stay alive was by drinking what water she could after turning the faucet on with her foot and splashing water onto her face.
According to the CDC, more than 14 million older Americans, defined as ages 65 and older, experience a fall every year; that means roughly one in four seniors falls annually, resulting in over 3 million emergency room visits and 1 million hospitalizations.
The Horrifying Bathtub Incident
Rivet was getting ready for bed on June 1 when she stepped backward and fell into the tub. On the way down, she tried to clutch onto the shower curtain to stabilize herself, but her weight dragged the rod down with her. She hurt her back and couldn’t pull herself out. With her phone in the other room, and her cat Phoebe utterly useless in the situation, she yelled and yelled with no one to hear.
Rivet drifted in and out of consciousness and watched daylight fade into darkness over and over while the pain and dehydration took their toll, prayer being the only respite.
It wasn’t until June 10 that Rivet’s brother, living in Georgia, got worried when she stopped returning his calls. Neighbors told him that her car was still in the driveway, so Haywood County deputies conducted a welfare check and found her still alive, but barely, semiconscious, in the tub.
Doctors treated Rivet for severe dehydration and bed sores before transferring her to a rehabilitation facility. She is recovering. Rivet told the Mountaineer that she now plans to move to Georgia to live near her family.