Aging body, failing mind

Don't read this blog kids. It's just me talking to myself and you don't need to be involved.

I'm hurting a lot. My back and left hip feel like knives are slicing into me. My hands ache and throb so much I can hardly stand it. Pain medication just makes me constipated (I told you not to read this) and doesn't do much for the pain anyway. I feel very dispairing and tired of hurting. Everything I want to do is so difficult. Everything that needs to be done has to be done by someone else. The only time I feel "normal" is driving the car and even that isn't the pleasure it used to be. After all, it was going someplace that was the fun - and now when I get someplace I can't do anything about it.

Oh, I guess I could take the electric scooter out of the car and get around that way. But it isn't that easy and now with my hands feeling so painful it's hard to me to assemble the scooter.

I don't know how I'm going to manage Germany. One of the things I've been thinking is getting a cortisone shot from the doctor - I've got a message out to him now. But as for my hands, I think I'll just have to take ibuprofen more often - or routinely. These days, I just take it when I'm hurting but I noticed that when I take it in the middle of the night (maintaining the level in my bloodstream) my days is much better. The problem at night, of course, is that I need to eat something along with the pill or it's hard on the stomach.

I was always such an active and busy person, I'm finding it hard to accept that I can't do that any more - both physically and mentally. I get tired and the more tired I am the more forgetful I am. I'm only 72 (well almost 73) and I'm hoping to be around for a while yet, but I don't want to if I'm going to be like Mom. Not that I have options.

There is an assumption that you will always remain yourself as you age - most people cannot even envision that it's not a choice how you age. I know I've seen crippled people all my life and somehow never imagined that the REASON they walked the way they did was because it was painful or they couldn't help it. It sounds stupid put that way, but on some level I presumed they had a choice and chose to "walk that way".....and I'm a nurse. Go figure.

The whole issue then becomes kind of scary because not only don't I know what it's going to be like, but I don't have any control over it. I know the press likes to print articles about "mental exercises" to ward off Alzheimers. Or diet and exercise you can do to stay fit into old age - but there are limits and I suspect those limits are a lot less than what people think. I know that Annecia was very angry when she got high blood pressure because she had been doing yoga for many, many years and it "shouldn't be happening" when you do yoga!! Right. I sort of feel the same way. I may not have done yoga, but I exercised (intermittantly it's true) and I tried to control my weight (with occasional success) and here I am.

I have a friend who is 95 and "failing"....and she doesn't want to give in. She wants to do everything she ever did - be on committees, go to seminars, volunteer for charities, head up counsels - and she can't. She doesn't want to give up her independance either - can I blame her? She gave up her car which I thought she'd never do....and I don't know if I could. She has to depend on other people - who are not always so dependable or interested. But, in some ways, she is a role model because she keeps plugging along. She does the best she can, she struggles to maintain her dignity and independance and she tries to "be there" for her children and grandchildren. And those are all my goals too.

So aging is a process - like growing up and not nearly as exciting. It is the slow loss of physical capability, mental acuity and ability to deal with stress and change. I used to tell my patients that it wasn't fair that at a time in life when change is so difficult we are expected to make the biggest adjustments - the loss of a life partner - giving up a treasured home - dealing with illness
and debility.

Phooey!