Further to Slowing Down
There are several things you might expect as you find yourself approaching the end of life.
Losing Memories
I find myself asking “When did we get that?” pointing to a picture that has hung in that location for at least five years. I’m introduced to people I’ve known for a while. “You remember Roberta and Dick, right?” My reply is usually, “Sure. How have things been going?” Unsaid is, “Who the Hell are these people?” We ride past a water tower; I ask how long that has been there. “Since we moved here eight years ago.”
In church people approach me, shake my hand and tell me it’s good to see me again. Again? I’ve never met you before. I begin watching a television episode, and laugh at all the appropriate places, just as I did last week. I find myself failing utterly at navigation. I haven’t driven since 2019 and have no idea where we are. I still remember my wife’s favorite recipe (“Table for two, please”) but have no idea what she likes to eat.
Speaking of food
I ask my wife, “Do I like this?” She’s an excellent cook, and I prefer her cooking to my mother’s. For my life I can’t recall what we had for dinner last night. “Where did the turkey and stuffing come from?” It turns out that it was leftovers from our next-door neighbor. The most significant change for me is that my appetite has virtually disappeared. And I don’t particularly like meat anymore. I’m rather like a herd animal that has realized he is not far from death and departs the herd to die alone.
Health
I have a history of bladder cancer (2x) and need cystoscopies regularly. It is not my favorite procedure. I’ve had two heart attacks and two ischemic strokes, the first at the age of thirty. It left me with a right pronator drift (the stroke was lower left frontal lobe) and some slight expressive aphasia. The second one was at the age of 66 on the right and left the aphasia worse. Along the way I’ve had perhaps ten or twelve TIAs (Transient Ischemic Attacks, mini strokes), developed both migraines and cluster headaches, have trigeminal neuralgia type one on the left, type two on the right, and occipital neuralgia on the back of my head. I began getting partial complex seizures in about 2018 and something called an essential tremor in my right hand. I take medications for each of these, any and all of which leave me in a stupor.
The big one is something called Normal Pressure Hydrocephalus, which is a misnomer. It is not normal pressure, instead it is late-onset hydrocephalus and is incapacitating. The strokes and TIAs robbed me of much of my sense of balance; the NPH finished the job. I am confined to a wheelchair or a walker. Urinary incontinence has no solution, and the disease is a one-way ticket to non-Alzheimer’s dementia. My wife must now run the household finances, and I can feel the IQ points dripping from various holes in my head.
Looking to the Future
Until this past July, we had planned to slowly renovate our home so we could leave it as a legacy for our daughter. Once she passed away, we’re rather stuck. We’ve given up the idea of replacing the metal circular stairway to the gallery overlooking the living room. We’ve stopped work on upgrading the kitchen. We replaced our flooring, some 50+ years old. All our lives we have had to make sub-optimal decisions due to lack of cash. We had acquired a great deal of debt keeping our younger daughter alive. Today most of our assets are in cash. earning less than 3% while inflation continues apace at 8%. I am 74 and my wife is 71. We will eventually need to leave, if only because I have no sense of balance, and we’ve learned that my wife cannot lift me from the floor on her own. I’m pretty useless in case of a fall. My wife does not need any of the seservices of specialized elder housing.
Daily Routine
I get up at about five a.m., come out to sit in my recliner while I have a banana, then fall asleep until about nine a.m. It’s not unusual for me to sleep as much as 20 hours per day.
In Conclusion
Growing old is not for the faint of heart.
But you help us all with these bittersweet ruminations.
"A day is like a whole life. You start out doing one thing, but end up doing something else, plan to run an errand, but never get there.… And at the end of your life, your whole existence has that same haphazard quality, too. Your whole life has the same shape as a single day.” - Michael Crichton, an author you recommended to me.