Reply to Does anyone else not want to live to be very old?

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[quote=Anonymous]I’ve spent the last 7 years working as a caregiver, primarily to hospice status patients. A few were unfortunate untimely deaths from cancer, stroke and early onset Alzheimer’s, but the majority were very elderly folks in their mid to late 90s. As I write this post I am sitting vigil with my current patient, a 96 year old woman who I have been caring for on hospice for the last 16 months - yes sometimes hospice takes a long time, the dying of a body is an unpredictable thing. This lovely lady has taught me a lot about life and what it is to really live - and how brutal it can be to have declined to a point where your body doesn’t work much at all, you cannot toilet yourself, you can barely feed yourself and can only chew a little so your enjoyment of even the basic things of life is seriously curtailed. This lovely lady has been in emotional pain for the entire time I’ve known her, desperate to be free from the prison her body has become and the endless Groundhog Day her life has become. We wouldn’t make a dog live this way, with so little quality of life.

My grandmother and great grandmother lived into their 90s, but my mother died in her early 70s. She had been a heavy smoker for decades and had advanced COPD, plus she was in an abusive marriage for decades and didn’t have any zest for living for many years so I think she was ready to succumb to whatever. My grandmother was an upbeat person and still planting flower boxes every spring into her 90s. If I could be that I wouldn’t mind the extra years, but if I was plagued with serious chronic illnesses that limited my mobility and caused chronic pain I would be much less inclined to stick around. I became a hospice caregiver when my own health broke down and I had to quit practicing law at 45. It took several years for medicine to figure out all my issues and in the meantime I gained a lot of weight, so when this patient dies I’m taking a few months off to focus hardcore on my own health and establishing a routine of self care which I’ve never really had - I spent decades as a workaholic getting poor sleep and taking little care of myself and the toll on my health was huge, I fully expect my lifespan was shortened by the near decade of chronic insomnia I suffered among other serious issues. I now feel very strongly that I need to take care of myself and get my body to feeling better to make the most of whatever years I have left. Getting my body strong so it can withstand the devastations of aging as well as possible is a priority for me - I’ve seen what happens to people who sit down in retirement and rarely get up again - the core strength goes very quickly in sedentary elders meaning anyone 65+ so if you aren’t doing anything about exercising or building strength your quality of life will quickly decline especially if/when you start losing balance and start having falls.

I’ve definitely seen some 90-somethings who still have a great quality of life, but they are the minority. In my opinion it’s mostly about what you have going on, if anything. Too many elders have nothing going on and spend most of their time sitting. Sitting is terrible for the human body, period. We were not made to sit.

I agree with Dr. Emanuel about limited medical interventions after 75. Depending on the diagnosis, I would be very unlikely to treat any cancer after 75. In very few cases - like Jimmy Carter’s- a very elderly person can complete cancer treatment and still have a good quality of life. For most people it’s the start of the closing of doors and windows and the narrowing of life.

I hold open the possibility that my mind will change with actual personal experience - I certainly know a lot about it the endless capacity of the human mind to surprise us. But at this point I would say that I have no desire whatever to be living when I can no longer wash, toilet and feed myself. I have plans in mind for when that happens but I sure wish by the time is does we have medical aid in dying so I won’t have to rely on methods which might not be foolproof. The biggest fear of my life after doing this work I’ve done the last few years is to end up incapacitated and at the mercy of others. [/quote]

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