I am finding that getting older and new health problems is causing me to become more cautious and even fearful some times and honestly I don't like feeling this way. My faith has always sustained me through good and bad in my life...and still does. But getting older and developing new health problems has affected me and not for the better either. I don't like this and I was just wondering if any of you have felt the same way and how you dealt or deal with these feelings.
Three years ago on 29 October the VA sent me home with 3 prescriptions and as I found out later, they didn't expect to see me again, as in, went home to die. My wife and I both had some pretty big health problems but we decided to go against the odds and get healthy no matter what we were told. We started going to the gym last year and changed our diet to meet our own needs and not some recommended cardboard stamped recipe for the masses. We started thinking positively and didn't keep dwelling on what was wrong but rather sought out more ways to make things better. For instance, I was told that a man my age couldn't build muscle. Wrong! I absolutely will compete in the Alabama Masters bodybuilding tournament in 2018 and have a couple of professionals who are willing to go in as sponsors. Yvonne is able to do more now than I've seen her able to do in 15 years and I believe she will still progress even further. woo hoo! I'm not saying that there is any quick fix to our aging problems, but I see and know some of the old folks at the gym every time I work out and we all agree on one principle: We all do what we do not to necessarily live longer, but to have a better quality of life while we're still on earth. It's mind, body, and spirit. If one part is missing from the equation, the equation doesn't work.
I'm not more fearful but I'm a tad more careful with my back but that's about it....my main concern is a back spasm and being laid up for a week with nobody to take care of me...I can barely move when my back spasms...thankfully it's been about 3 years now since my last one.
I really love this post Bobby! You were open and honest and used simple and plain language that was so easy to understand. And you have basically said what has been said many times before..."If you don't use it, you will lose it." You and @Yvonne Smith inspire us to believe we can achieve more than we think we can now that we are older and that is a wonderful thing. I may not be able to do everything I want to do...but I can still do more than I think I can if I just walk forward instead of standing still. Thank you.
I totally agree that we should do as much as we can to keep going, and I think it is important to remember to customize a routine that fits each of us individually. For years I kept trying to match what others did, thinking what was successful for one person would be great for me. Not so. I caused myself injury after injury by trying to follow the popular exercise forms. Strength is not what I can shoot for, but flexibility is. I do my best to use my Gazelle exerciser at least 15 minutes in the morning and evening. I'm not over weight so I can direct my diet towards building my immune system. I think a problem that many seniors, especially single seniors, encounter is isolation, and this too can have negative effects on a person's health. It often brings about depression. I know I have always had a tendency to isolate myself, and have all my life, but now I am single I am trying to reach out to those around me more. I started to pay attention to how many people are dealing with depression. Trying to help just those people around me that are dealing depression makes it impossible for me to allow myself fall into it now. It's hard to cheer someone up if your depressed as well.
@Babs Hunt I think the hardest part for me is getting used to the feeling of being humiliated by the new conditions I live in. (But I also know that that can be a spiritual growth exercise if looked at properly, which I manage to do at least some of the time.) I really resented having to give up adorable high-heeled shoes for big old, ugly flat ones that look like they are made out of tires, feeling I lost my femininity instantly; but not falling over, and not spraining my ankle every few years was the payoff. But ugly shoes are still ugly shoes! Having to wear glasses made me mad because I am, or was, very vain of my appearance and glasses ruin that completely, of course. My arthritis means that some days I struggle to get up from a seated position and I find it really humiliating to have to do that in public. And the fear you mention is very real. I try to avoid being out after dark now, both because of less visual acuity and fear of being mugged and being unable to run to safety which means I rarely go out in the evening anymore. Yes, that is it, being old and creaky in public really bugs me! At home I am cute and young in my own mind's eye, but in public I have to suddenly be this old and vulnerable creature who younger, faster people don't mind knocking out of their way if I am going too slowly for them! Their attitude in itself makes me fearful of further incapacity. How do I deal with these feelings? Just carry on, I guess, grateful for another day of life and hoping for the best!
We all have to face certain realities concerning age. We're not invulnerable any longer, wrinkles appear where we do not want them, hormone changes seem to be a daily issue and we simply do not heal as quickly as we once did. With all of that comes the mental uncertainties such as conditions I call "the what if's" or the "I can'ts". The realization that no, we can't run the mile in less than whatever time, and yes, dancing the jitterbug will probably throw my back out permanently. If I eat this or that the EPA will designate my body as a methane threat to global warming. I can't see as well, hear what I used to and Viagra is looking better and better. Now, there is another reality we must face in order to start making our aging quality of life a little better. How long did it take to get the way we are? No, I'm not talking about our age but how long did we go before we started paying attention to the conditions of our age? It's kind of like having a pocket full of money when we were younger. Most of us spent it like it was growing on trees never paying attention to its longevity until we found it was almost gone. In other words, we went along, health wise, never paying much attention to our condition until yep, just about gone. Now, we blame our age and because we are told we really can't reverse many of the processes of age, there is less and less hope of maintaining a good quality of life taking our egos and confidence levels with it. The trick, to me, is to treat a lot of the information flying around out there as false news. We see other people with their deteriorating condition, listen to folks who are apparently down for the count and believe, really believe that our next great adventure is a mound at Pleasant Hills. Because everything I have tried to make things better by purchasing every advertised over night fix doesn't work on me, I'm doomed. The truth is, our conditions didn't happen overnight so the fix doesn't happen that way either. Change takes time. But the last piece of reality is that "without change, there will be no change". Beyond eating healthier foods, our mouths do not control the rest of our body nor brain. We can't talk ourselves into having a better life, we have to do, to perform, to act. Once we start, and see the good changes, the confidence levels go up and we can be proud of an accomplishment well done.
I don't worry for myself but I do worry constantly for hubby, every little sneeze, cough, fart, puts me on edge.
Cautious, yes. While I have every reason to believe that I could still crawl onto the roof of our library (the only part that doesn't have a metal roof) and shovel the snow off of it in the winter, the last time I did that was a few years ago, and I was very afraid of falling the whole time. I suppose that's a reasonable fear, since it's not unheard of for me to fall walking to the car in the winter. Now I pay someone to do that. While I still go out in the woods alone, because that's not the sort of thing that that my wife enjoys, I worry more about something happening to me while I'm there. I can get lost on my own land, and there's no guarantee, walking there, that I won't wander onto endless acres of paper company land if I manage to reach one of the areas where there isn't a definable border. Just five years ago, I would have considered it to be an inconvenience to be lost in the woods for a couple of days, but I suppose it could be more than that today. That hasn't happened, by the way. So far, I haven't been lost for more than about ten hours. The problem is that, except for a few that I made, most of the comfortable walking trails don't necessarily take me back to my car, since they were made by moose, deer and bear, who probably weren't primarily interested in my finding my way back to my car. Most of my woodland is filled with fallen trees, brush and, depending on what time of the year it is, there might be ferns that look like they would be more at home in prehistoric times, as they grow taller than I am. Plus, since it's in a valley surrounded by three mountains, seasonal streams run through it, leaving behind marshy areas and holes filled with water. Then there are the beavers, who change the landscape from year to year. Anyhow, back on subject, I snowshoed back there one winter, since you can't get there by car in the winter. At one point, my left foot and leg sunk into the snow, with the snowshoe forming an anchor that prevented me from pulling my foot back out easily -- that and the fact that I had no leverage, since my right leg was parallel to the ground, while my left leg was buried in the snow. I was off the road so even if a snowmobiler were to come by, there is no way that they would be able to see me, or hear me shouting. My wife wasn't expecting me home until sometime the next day because I was going to either stay in the camp that night or get a motel room, and there's no cellular signal out there. Sometimes I can get a text through, but often that doesn't even make it. Yeah, I worried then. After waiting for the panic to subside, I was able to use my walking stick to pull a branch of a small tree down to where I could reach the larger part of the tree, and was able to pull myself out, although not without shedding some blood. Of course, when I am out there cutting trees down with my chainsaw, there are obvious dangers, yet I am not going to pay someone to come watch me cut trees down. I enjoy cutting trees down, and I have a fair idea of what I'm doing, but I'm not a professional logger, and the trees don't always land where I planned on having them land. I sometimes worry about cutting myself badly with the chainsaw. I was a paramedic for more than twenty years, and could probably manage to make my way back to my trauma kit, but not necessarily if a tree were to fall on my head. So far, however, I haven't even had a scare on that account. Although I am sometimes surprised or even dismayed with where they decide to fall, none of them has come close to landing on me. So yeah, I am more cautious than I used to be, and sometimes even fearful, but not unreasonably so, I think.
@Ken Anderson ... I was reading this part..and mentally screaming *ouch* ouch** and feeling the panic rising in myself at the very thought of ever being in that kind of position...not that I'm likely to be...but I'm sure even having been a Paramedic, and used to being calm in an emergency you must ave been very concerned that you might not manage to get out of that situation ... Quote'' ''Anyhow, back on subject, I snowshoed back there one winter, since you can't get there by car in the winter. At one point, my left foot and leg sunk into the snow, with the snowshoe forming an anchor that prevented me from pulling my foot back out easily -- that and the fact that I had no leverage, since my right leg was parallel to the ground, while my left leg was buried in the snow. I was off the road so even if a snowmobiler were to come by, there is no way that they would be able to see me, or hear me shouting. My wife wasn't expecting me home until sometime the next day because I was going to either stay in the camp that night or get a motel room, and there's no cellular signal out there. Sometimes I can get a text through, but often that doesn't even make it. Yeah, I worried then. After waiting for the panic to subside, I was able to use my walking stick to pull a branch of a small tree down to where I could reach the larger part of the tree, and was able to pull myself out, although not without shedding some blood.''
Yes good point I never thought of that... I panic in all crises lol....I could never be a paramedic...