Christmas can be a very lonely time, especially for the elderly. I hear time and time again on my radio show of people whose families just aren’t there for them. They’re too busy with their own lives to worry about their elderly parents, let alone visit them. I just don’t understand why people are so callous to the very ones who brought them into the world. Listen to this call my colleague Petrie Hosken took on her LBC show this afternoon.

listen to ‘83yo Gladys – the caller who had Petrie and her team in tears’ on Audioboo

Shame on them indeed.

Some people can be very condescending about talk radio. But where else would you hear gut wrenching stories like this, that make you sit down and think about the society we live in and the kind of families we have become? Petrie Hosken is brilliant on these sorts of subjects. When I first started at LBC I never thought I could handle emotional calls like this without having a bit of tear in my eye. And I was right. But I don’t worry about that now, and nor does Petrie. It’s called empathy. And it’s what this woman’s family need to learn the art of.