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I have a normal mamorgram, too. That was in doubt in December, but not as of an hour ago.
I'm not going out to be with my befuddled friend right now because her husband has entered hospice care -- that means he's dying right now -- and the house is full of people who are waiting for the end. There's just not a spot for another person to hang with Gloria.
IU've been around through the deathwatch now of four or so people. I notice that there is a point where everything changes: the person who is dying becomes a dying person and not an ill person. With my mother-in-law, that manifested as her stopping eating. With my mother, that manifested as a change in orientation. With my father-in-law, though he was unconscious (or at least unable to express himself)his expression changed. JIm changed by letting go of his anger at being helpless. He made the decision, though, to go off dialysis and die, so he wasn't as helpless as before, in this one big thing.
So naturally I'm thinking a lot about aging and dying lately, but not with the kind of "ohmydogitsgoingtohappenandicantdoanythingtopreventit" panic with which I usually approach it. How you age and die is part of the job of being a social person. You can't guarantee anything, of course, but you can't guarantee anything. Mu mother in law saw her death coming when she was about my age, started preparing for it and had as clean a death as you could wish for, thirty years later. I'm not nearly so organized as she is, and I regret it, since I no longer romanticize my mess. But I'm taking some steps.
One thing -- I'm now as certain as anyone can be that I'm doing all the things we know about for staving off dementia. I had that talk with the doctor, and he said well, nobody knows, except there's that aluminum correlation and nobody knows which way it goes: but other than that, prevent strokes, and I'm doing that.
I wasn't thinking about my own private anxieties when I started this. I was thinking about the process of dying, and I've lost that thought, but I'll regain it later when after I've done some work and found the nice fellow's nails.
I'm not going out to be with my befuddled friend right now because her husband has entered hospice care -- that means he's dying right now -- and the house is full of people who are waiting for the end. There's just not a spot for another person to hang with Gloria.
IU've been around through the deathwatch now of four or so people. I notice that there is a point where everything changes: the person who is dying becomes a dying person and not an ill person. With my mother-in-law, that manifested as her stopping eating. With my mother, that manifested as a change in orientation. With my father-in-law, though he was unconscious (or at least unable to express himself)his expression changed. JIm changed by letting go of his anger at being helpless. He made the decision, though, to go off dialysis and die, so he wasn't as helpless as before, in this one big thing.
So naturally I'm thinking a lot about aging and dying lately, but not with the kind of "ohmydogitsgoingtohappenandicantdoanythingtopreventit" panic with which I usually approach it. How you age and die is part of the job of being a social person. You can't guarantee anything, of course, but you can't guarantee anything. Mu mother in law saw her death coming when she was about my age, started preparing for it and had as clean a death as you could wish for, thirty years later. I'm not nearly so organized as she is, and I regret it, since I no longer romanticize my mess. But I'm taking some steps.
One thing -- I'm now as certain as anyone can be that I'm doing all the things we know about for staving off dementia. I had that talk with the doctor, and he said well, nobody knows, except there's that aluminum correlation and nobody knows which way it goes: but other than that, prevent strokes, and I'm doing that.
I wasn't thinking about my own private anxieties when I started this. I was thinking about the process of dying, and I've lost that thought, but I'll regain it later when after I've done some work and found the nice fellow's nails.
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And I've been thinking about all of that, and how we are all interacting with each other now, and your post was, well, I'm looking for a word. Keen, I think, is a good one. The process of dying is on my mind, this week.