A New Year A New Decade - for me Entering the 80's!

The Challenges of Aging

Spine Decline

My neighbor John has been walking my dog for me for about 6 months. He walks every day, two or three times a day, so it was no problem for him to pick up my dog for one of his walks. I had been walking her, first to the railroad and down to Northmont and around to my street, about a mile. Then my back began to decline and I lowered the walk to half a mile around a little local pond called Martin's Lake, a nice pavement and a pretty park view.

When John took over, I gratefully gave in to not walking. John is away with his wife and family for ten days and I am walking the dog again. Now, I get as far as where the two Food Trucks are parked, about two long blocks from my house and then back. By the time I reach the food trucks, parked at the corner at the end of the two long blocks, I have a pinching. biting pain in the right side of my lower back.

Of course, I have been to the orthopedic doctor about my spine. It began about 20 years ago with a severe pain in the space between my shoulders at the base of my neck. It was diagnosed as dessicated disc disease in C (cervical vertabrae) 3 through C 7 (just about all of them.) The Doctor warned me that it would spread down my spine over time. He was right and it has. Now it is in the lumbar region, and I know this because something dreadful happened to me over a year ago and I went to another ortopedic doctor and had xrays.

The first orthopedic doctor at Regional Orthophpedics, was my doctor from my 50's when I tore the meniscus in my left knee. I had gone to him for shots in my knee and he had prescribed Celebrex which I took until I discoverd it had nearly destroyed my kidneys. By then, I had a new medical service, Cooper Health and a new general practitioner and she referred me to a new Cooper Health orthopedic doctor.

The disaster that happened to me was that I turned in bed in the middle of the night, and became paralyzed in a lightning bolt of nerve pain. I couldn't move for 6 hours, until nearly daylight. I thought my hip had locked up somehow but the new orthopedic doctor said the xrays showed it was my lower back and I had suffered a back spasm. He prescribed some serious muscle relaxants in case it happened again but that was about all that could be done. I have not slept in a bed since that night. I sleep in a recliner.

Vision

That is one impending doom. Another one is my vision. Also in my 50's my eyesight began to fail in a strange and subtle way - first with colors like brown and navy and black when I was putting on socks in the morning, then as time progressed, with reading. Eventually, over the next decade, I went to 3 different eye doctors. 2 opthalmologists, then a cornea specialist because I was diagnosed with Fuch's Dystrophy - an inherited degenerative cornea disease for which there is no cure short of cornea transplant which involves transplant drugs and other complications. It will progress at individual rates. So far, mine has been slow and painless. But, I can no longer read, or read street signs or highway signs, or the gps map on the dashboard, so driving has become limited. I will eventually be blind. I listen to audio books.

Cognitive decline

Another problem with my driving has been a noticeable cognitive decline in the area of mind mapping. I used to be able to visualize the route to familiar far off places like a restaurant and antique shop I liked in Burlington, a hiking trail in Bordentown, and even some closer places. Sometimes the mind map just goes blank and I cannot see in my mind the route I was once so familiar with - like one day going to the veterinarian! I took a wrong turn and was driving all over the place trying to find my way back. So far this is the only sign of cognitive decline that I have noticed. Mostly my mind is sharp and my memory is good.

Memory

My memory seems to be in the normal range, by which I mean that I have no more trouble remembering things than most people at any age - the name of a an actor or a writer, or a favorite book or movie may temporarily evade me. Eventually, it comes to me. So far my two biggest problems are my spine and my vision, but I also have a lot of discomfort and crippling from my toes! >p/> First, a lifetime of slanted toed shoes has crushed my toes into an arthritic mess. That has caused toenail trouble from the curled under toes. Then, when I thought that was resolved with a good local nail salon, I got an infected toe there and discovered, after visiting the podiatrist, that somehow I had mysteriously invured my big toenail, broke it right in half and injured the nail bed. I thought I had a nail fungus but she said it was not a fungus but a broken nail and injured nail bed and a bacterial infection at the injury site. The infection is cleared up, the toe is still painful and medicare will only allow me to go to the podiatrist every two months so my nails are growing too long and exacerbating my problems. It makes it difficult and painful to walk. I need to find a new and more sterile nail salon.

Hearing

My latest decline is in hearing. Next year when I visit my general practitioner, Dr. Deborah Ubele, I will ask her to refer an ear doctor in the Cooper Health system. I can hear sitting at a small table with a friend, but not across a room. It isn't a problem of volume, but clarity. The speech is mumbled sounding, garbled. I can hear clear speakers sufficiently, but low voiced people are lost to me. None of these things are specific to me alone, half of my friends have hearing loss, all my friends have back problems some much worse than mine. Although others wear glasses or contact lenses, none has a permanent vision decline like mine - that is unique to me. Some of my friends have issues specific to them. We all have impairments due to our age.

The Future - Aging in place

As I face the future these situations cause me sudden spells of anxiety. I rely on my youngest sister for so much, but she is a heavy smoker and drinker, and I worry about her health and her son, my Godson and nephew, who is emotionally unstable. My sister is my Rock of Gibralter and to this point she is strong, reliable, kind and generous with her help. I pay her $30 ah nour and she usually works for 3 hours at a time for $100. She helps me do grocery shopping, cleaning, takes the laundry to the basement and she has been helping me move my overload of possessions along - the Free Books Project, Clothes for the Homeless, and so on.

A friend of mine, Barb S., has the perfect resolution to all of this. She is selling her house and moving to the Quaker care community at Medford Leas. She is going into a one bedroom apartment and she will no longer face yard work, snow shoveling, home repair or driving issues. At present she lives in a BIG house on a wooded lot with 3 bedrooms, two floors, and a big deck to maintain. Her pets have all died and she will be able to eat in the restaurant and cafeteria at Medford Leas and she will have compaionship there and lectures, hiking, bus trips - sounds marvelous.

Such a thing is not possible for me because I have 5 cats and a dog and I love them. My dog and two of my oldest cats will probably die within 5 years, but my kitte%s are only 6 and will live another 10 years. I have to stay home. And I love my house. My solutions have included the idea of my sister moving in with me and me leaving her living rights to the house when I die (my daughter inherits the property). My daughter isn't keen on the idea because she doesn't want to be left in any way responsible for the house or my sister, but she may have to adjust to that reality. A secondary idea might be to have my sister move in and take care of the pets, but I souldn't be able to go to Medford Leas because that would require that I sell the house for the 'buy-in' cost which is high! For a studio apartment it would be about $200,000 and $3000 a month, if I could even get in. They won't take you if you are sick. The option would be to move into an income adjusted assisted lviing facility of which there are more and more being built and one in this town, and two in next door Gloucester City.

For now, I am taking one day at a time, and I feel good. well and competent and sufficiently supported to live as I am. It is good to think about the future but not to be filled with fear about it. I can only hope I don't get a stroke or some kind of paralyzing crisis of health. Then, it is all out of my hands anyway. So, I will just live in the present and do what I can to maintain.

The Other Oldies

As close as I was with my grandmothers, I have often thought how they never mentioned a word of anything they must have been going through with aging. They stayed home until a cataastropic health crisis propelled them into the nursing homes where they died within about 2 years of entering. One had senile dementia, the other had heart attacks.

Well, now that's all put down in writing here on the blog and I can put it out of my mind. The farthest into the future I am planning now is to be more pro-active with my physical activity (the dog walk) and maybe returning to the gym, and getting a grip on my spending and credit debt with amazon and Bank of America. New Years is a great time for those resolutions! No more Amazon! No more credit card spending! Live closer witin my means!

In truth, the credit card debt wasn't frivoity - it was veterinary. Uma has cost me quite a lot in vet bills as have the cats, one at a time. That is where most of the B of A credit card debt came from. Amazon is entirely my own fault. That one I must work on seriously and it is a difficult one. Wish me luck!

This cannot be my New Years Post because it is too grim. But I have to say, as far as such things go, I am doing OK! Pretty Well in fact, and I am pretty happy most of the time. And I live in a good place, a home I love, a town I love, with great neighbors, and with the help of my sister, whom I also help, I am doing just great! As the comedian Tom Papa says "Look at You, Look at You! Still Alive! Good Work!"

Happy trails no matter how steep and rocky! wrightj45@yahoo.com