When I grow old and other people take care of me, I hope I will be served strong brewed coffee with real cream and that I can eat my breakfast at 10 o’clock in the morning and not between 8-9:00 o’clock. I want to take bubble baths with the lingering scent of Verbena and Patchouli and have my lunch at 1:00 in the afternoon. I’ve always enjoyed a glass of wine in the evening with my meal; it is a ritual of sorts with deep roots in my family history…a time that reminds me of listening to Edith Piaf with my father and sipping on Zinfindel while talking about the state of affairs or his adventures during World War II. My father had his last glass of Zinfindel at lunchtime on March 3, 1994. He went to take his daily nap afterwards and died while napping. What a wonderful way to live: to die while sleeping, while dreaming…
He’d been diagnosed with a few ailments – had open heart surgery at the age of 80 and underwent chemotherapy and radiation for prostate cancer at the age of 79. The invasive procedures had been recommended by his doctors. I did not agree with them, but, my dad wanted to extend his life. He loved living and most of all wanted to be with my mom for as many more years as he could squeeze out of his aging body. I doubted he had the resilience to bounce back from the toll of biopsies, anesthesia, surgery, radiation, chemotherapy, and the trauma of hospitalization. I worried that such treatments would accelerate his downward trajectory, ushering in a prolonged period of decline and dependence – what some people refer to as ”death by intensive care.”
Thankfully, his projectory of decline was not years but rather months after the heart surgery. He was lucky. I don’t know that people really understand what happens to their bodies as they age. I have only become interested in the process because of the work I do and the advocate that I have become for accepting the aging process for what it is: a natural event.
There are times when a family wants everything to be done at all costs to keep their loved one alive – to repair him or her once more, no matter how old or how frail. We have become accustomed to the commonality of medical miracles over an extended lifespan, and not knowing when to stop asking for them can be a tragedy when it comes to late-life healthcare decisions. Learning the clinical realities of an aging body has helped me accept the finite passage of time we have on this earth.
Decline increases with each long-lived year; death will come. How those last years are navigated represents a choice. We must begin to question, and, to some degree, reverse the full-scale medicalization of old age, both in our outlook and in our institutions. I hope that I will be accepting of my old age and that I will forgo most interventionist procedures in favor of conscious aging. I want to use those last years when my body is wearing down to sit quietly with others, to listen deeply to music, to look at myself and at life’s journey. That I might be able to deepen my wisdom and prepare for my exit, rather than to suffer through endless medical procedures that might not leave me with enough left over for contemplation of life’s mystery, is my plan for growing old.
