Its only been a year since I last wrote here. In that year I have had a heart attack and an implant. I also now have speech aphasia (cannot speak a word I know). Basically, things are not getting better and I'm kinda on my way. I have been told that learning to play a musical instrument might help and I'm considering that Irish drum which is pretty neat. I m also taking lession in spanish as that too might help. So far nothing helps and it just keeps on going.
I also do exercises, every morning. I spend an half an hour on a machine that is supposed to be like hiking through the snow. After that I lift a 10lb weight something like 60 times for each arm (means I lift something like 3 tons every week). I have been told that I am in pretty good shape (which may, or may not be true).
My ability to pay attention to something specific over time is mud. My memory is really not all that bad although I do forget stuff. My wife has moved on to trying to mother me which I have seriously fought. She worries when I drive although she is the one that gets tickets and I think I drive just fine. In about 2 weeks I will be 89 years old. All my friends, and my wife now will help me say a word I can't speak with no problem. Its was kinda embarrassing but OK. For instance, I am standing in front of a door and I carrying stuff and can't open the door and can't say the word "door". What I do is say something like; "I need somebody to open that thing in front of me" and somebody will say; "door" and then open it for me. That's become so standard its just the way it is.
I also have COPD dementia (which includes Cognitive impairment) One good thing is that I now understand what 'dementia' means) Apparently I don't have Altzheimers (I have a VA shrink and he told me that I was unlikely to get Altzheimers. I thought I already had it but all of this stuff herein is not, apparently, Altzheimers) None of this stuff is fun but when you consider the alternative .............
Now all this stuff will seem, to many, as a personal hell. On my side I have come to accept what is going on because there is, really, very little one can do to change anything. Hopefully, if anybody old reads this and its just beginning for them it might give them some thought about what is going on instead of the age old solutions of thinking about suicide. It really isn't all that bad as, after a while, one becomes used to whatever.
I get all the help I need and I have both the local hospital and the VA to help me should I need it. I am not rich but I pay all my bills and I have no debt. So, basically, I am fine with problems which are really all that bad (I'm still walking and driving).
I have been living long enough to see a pile of stuff get fixed (I would remind that there is stuff getting fixed EVERY DAY!!). There was the one where you spent the rest of your life in a big, steel, breathing machine. My father died a blind man - I got the same disease (macular degeneration, which seems to run in families. Apparently my two sisters have the beginning) and my retinal doctors cured me (they only stuck needles into an eye a few times). There are all those diseases that I got shots for when I was young (and still get them). When I went to a doctor about being kinda dizzy and they found out my heart was almost working, 16 times a minute, they had me on a table two days later, in another city (Silverdale, where they had St Michael's), fixing my heart and implanting a defibrillator (and learned how they count - "01, 02, 03, 04, 05" etc. When I goto a doctor the first thing I ask if if they have the pill yet, as I assume that there is a lot of work being done on all this stuff I have mentioned, and I have kindofa hope that somebody will figure out how to fix this and that. Even if I don't it helps.
This was kinda interesting to write. I think that it might have actually helped me (I had no idea I would go on so long - apologies) and, hopefully, it wasn't a whining too much.
Last edited by jgw; 02/28/24 07:55 PM.
