Concessions

An outrageous sunset from 2010

Talking about concessions to old age here.

I keep running into myself, the old self. The one who thinks she'll wake up in the morning and she'll have been "fixed" overnight into what she used to be. You know, tennis, marathons, hiking. And that's just before breakfast.The acceptance of where I'm actually at physically has taken forever to penetrate. I've gotten glimmers, of course, but not complete acceptance. And I know that acceptance doesn't mean approval.

But I need to deal and stop this magical thinking. And I think I've made headway in the past week.

I had a terrible experience during the week where I did too much in one day, didn't pace myself, and nearly collapsed in a grocery store, felt ill. Completely out of steam. Pain like gawd knows what.

I called my Whine Buddy the following day after first of all brushing off some smaller commitments as I was cranky, upset, overly tired and felt like a blight on humanity.

I always feel like a new woman, freshly invigorated, after talking with her, she is only in her fifties but has challenging physical issues of her own, compounded by an elderly parent now in hospital. She has to use his old walker to visit him, she's the only designated visitor due to Covid. And the interminable trudge through the poorly designed Health Science Centre here has to be seen to be believed. Instead of pushing the design upwards, they went all over the map into a massive sprawl of unmarked corridors and cul-de-sacs. this with an aging demographic. I've had to be pushed though it in a wheelchair just to get from clinic to clinic.

But I digress.

We started coming to terms with "I'll have to ask for help" which is something we hate to do. I just know I can't face another day like Wednesday where I thought I'd be one of those carted off, unconscious, in an ambulance. Afterwards I went to the lake and bawled like a baby. This is an honest blog.

I need to explain myself better to those who care about me. And stop pretending. Say no without fear. Accept the help of a friend recently who said she help with some physical therapy. Accept the help of loved ones who offer to pick up groceries. Have Joanna come once a week to do what's necessary here. Stop complaining about the increased cost of my podiatrist.

And every time I start to feel I can't carry on ask that old question a therapist way back had taught me."Because?" If you've never heard of it I'll post about it the next time. It's enormously helpful and I had forgotten about it until someone in Zoom mentioned it recently.

So I've hauled it out.

And I tumbled across this photo looking for something else. How Ansa, the Wonder Dog, loved to pose. 2009. She makes me smile now, it took me years to stop crying over photos of her.

The Wilderness of Old Age

Good days - rare
Bad days - many
Isolation - sometimes deliberate
Body a temple to pain much of the time
Serious consideration of sedation/tranquilization to ensure a hazy nirvana within.
Avoiding questions like "how are you?" feeling no one wants to know the truth.
Feeling a bore in the doctor's office, reading the list of all that ails me off my phone.
Feeling inadequate and whiny when other elders seem to surmount all that challenges them and put on the cheery face and the lipper/shave meticulously and go out and greet the world sprinkling stardust in spite of/because of. I wish they would package that up and sell it to me.
Feeling death stalking some days and being brave. Alone but biofeedbacking myself.
Crying easily.
Living in the past at times, not consciously, but uneasily when aware of it.
Having difficulty planning something to look forward to (my father's way of negotiating old age) as my good days/bad days are so unpredictable.
Thinking of my granny turning her face to the wall and thinking "now I get it."
It is a very confusing time for many of us. There is no pattern but reaction. I can mantra my brains out but I'm still left in the wilderness.

On the upside:

I do make my bed every day.

I dress some days, others are pajama days - my favourite. When I dress I venture more outside my perfect little nest and I know that's good for me.

I read every day.

I knit every day.

I try and write every day (herewith)

I immerse myself at night in series like "Doc Martin" which helps.

I am really careful who I share with as being left hanging, blowing in a cold wind with no response, makes me feel worse. And that happens more than one would think.

I am very, very aware that others I care about, including some bloggers, are in far worse shape than I am. If we compare our health deficiencies. We can't really though.

Our ill-health bubbles are ours alone, and sometimes there is no map or compass to find the way out.

The winter of my discontent.

Intermittent telephone and internet problems which Bob, the Bell repairman, has tried to fix a few times now. He's back again today. He's like an old friend.

How does he remain cheerful in the face of a biting blizzard of ice pellets hitting his face. Outside, wearing mitts as he splices narrow gauge wires and bits of plastic as I hobble around indoors, still in pyjamas and robe.

I feel proud I managed to offload and then reload the dishwasher. Everything is a remarkable effort in the jabs of pain crawling up and down my spine. Stoic I am not. My pain threshold is very low. I learned that in childbirth.

I do a tally in my fingers. My BFF dying so horribly, leaving me bottled up with grief and heartbreak.

My chimney fire, still unresolved, still waiting for parts for the chimney and for the weather to stabilize to let the repair guys on the roof.

Even though I don't heat most of my rooms, my electricity bills are high enough to leave me a little breathless each time they pop into my email for normally the wood stove heats the house.

I try and balance all this off with the positives, a series of workshops I'll be conducting on memoir writing with a publish at the end of it, my new musical drama back on track (we think – casting out here on the Edge is always a challenge) and private software training sessions. And knitting. And reading. And writing.

And somehow, it's not enough.

You can call me a whinebag.

I won't mind.

In fact, you can join me.

Perennially cheerful doesn't cut it today.