Eating healthy and modern medicine

We often hear about doing things to keep yourself healthy and live a longer life.

About how Coke is not good for you so now we will spend more for a bottle of water than a Coke.
We need to grow a garden and raise a cow; because all those farmers keep putting chemicals in our food.
Smoking is a big no no and on and on we go trying to live till we are 100 years old.

Health care has also come a long way.
During the civil war leg and arm amputations was the #1 operation.
We did not understand that taking the bullet out was only a small part because we did not understand germs.
Not today; we can not only fix many parts of your body; we can take a part from a pig and put it into your body.
Never mind the cost; we want medical science to be so good we could live till we are over 100 years old.

So now I live in a age where I do not have to fear dying at 45 or 50 years old.
I do live in a age where I have to worry about paying for this health care that lets me live to 100.
I also have to worry about how I am gona pay for this nursing home they put me into because my mind did not last as long as my body did.
So as we sit in the nursing home pooping our pants and sucking our thumbs; we wonder where did we go wrong.

I know when a love one is the victim it is a real hard choice.
But when as a society are we gona realize that we were put on this earth for one thing.
Like every other mammal we were put here to live long enough to have offspring and raise said offspring to a age they can go out on their own.
Any time past that is considered lagniappe.

I just feel we put to high a value on living today.
We will go threw our whole life not enjoying life because we choose things based on how healthy they are for us rather than just saying to heck with it "I'm gona enjoy my life"
We will also (and here is the big one) spend hundreds of thousands of dollars for medical treatments that sometimes only extends the life by a couple of years.

So do I need to commit myself to the closest psych ward for thinking this way?

I don't think so!

All of these people drinking special shakes and going to their personal trainer need to come put up hay with me or spend a day working cattle. I struggled for years to keep up to 165 and I am 6'4". Look at old pictures. They are all more fit. Aged faster, but more fit. Life was harder but when we think of how "hard" it was that's because they did manual labor and worked in the heat. Those are things I still do, but I'm not walking behind a single plow. I still do enough to keep my body fit.

I was at my rheumatologist and he said, "you are really in the wrong line of work for your arthritis." He wants me to be able to swim each day because it's good for my joints. I told him I may be wearing it out sooner and it may hurt and ache more, but I'm not sitting on some couch talking about my aching body and eating a bag of chips. I still maintain I am doing my body a better service by working the soup out of it on this farm each day.

You probably do but on the bright side you'll have plenty of company. See you there!

That is an easy position to take when your healthy, and it was my way of thinking until recently too. I suppose if I was older and had lived longer I might still feel that way. But if your 52 years old and looking at a near and painful death your views change. If you had said to me just a few years ago that they were spending 10 grand a month to keep you alive with no end in sight, I would have offered a revolver to you and suggested a one way walk into the woods. I wouldn't do that today.

John I would bet that you would have a vastly different view IF you where facing death right this moment!!!!

My fear is that with external_link Care in full effect in 4-5 years those decisions will be made by the GOVERNMENT to "cut "costs" in health care.

Here are a few things I can see easily happening:

1) If your over a certain age you will NOT be eligible for certain health care procedures. Like if your over 75 you can not get knee replacement surgery???

2) If your over weight you can not have heart surgery until you lose weight. Age does not figure into the equation. (This one is in effect in England right now)

3) IF your current health issue as caused by illegal activity in the past you would not be able for treatment. An example would be meth use or cocaine use.

Then the one statement I really find unsettling is: "I just feel we put to high a value on living today" That sounds like one of the things many "leaders" have used right before they genocide a while group of people. The Nazis thought that the Jews and Most other minorities where not "worth" breathing air. That was THEM placing a LOW value on living. So I would rather the powers that control our lives place a HIGH value on living less they start to act as OUR lives have little value.

Yes jon it is a real hard position to take when it is yourself or a loved one that we are talking about.
But very easy for somebody on the outside looking in to say it.

I have had to make some of these decisions concerning my mom and dad in the past few years.
In hindsight I know some were right but some were also very wrong.

I just think we are headed down the wrong road with healthcare.
We complain about healthcare cost and the related insurance cost.
Yet when we walk into a hospital we want a sit down place with soothing running water and a guy playing a piano in the back ground so we can take our minds off of the reason we are there.
When the doctor walks into the room the only question we have is "can you fix it"
No mention is ever given to "how much is this gona cost" or "what are my odds of your fix working"

And god forbid; when the inevitable does happen; anyone would consider burying you in a plain pine box.

I just think we put to much value on a life.
We fight wars to where if one bystander gets killed it makes national news.
We will give someone on death row bypass surgery.
We will hock the farm to get the latest pill or surgery to extend our life by 5 years.
Then when that love one does die we throw thousands of dollars at a funeral to show how much we loved them.

I guess I may have be born in the wrong century.
I shoulda been born when we fought wars with nuclear bombs; hung criminals at dawn; knew dying was part of life and accepted it; and said a prayer over a loved one when we buried them in the back yard.

I would agree. The thing that gets me is our government being "exempt" from them. My dad always said "If our government had to have the same health care we did.....we would have better health care".

In some respects, they have you over a barrel. If you want to live, it is going to cost you. Even if you are healthy....its going to cost you. Its not necessarily always that costly, it is what is tacked on to the cost that raises it. If everyone is required to have health insurance then how will a hospital justify very high cost in an emergency room visits now? The excuse was always to pay for those who don't have insurance. Quantity isn't always better than quality. Everyone has to have a piece of your dollar....

JD
I have a do not resuscitate order I signed when I turned 50.
If it takes electricity to keep me alive or bring me back I do not want it.
I have never been cut on and will likely never be cut on now that my kids are grown.

Knee replacement surgery would be a stretch.
But a heart transplant would not at that age.
There is a sign at our corner store right now.
Guy has been smoking his entire life (50+ something years old now) and now he is looking for people to donate money to him so he can pay to fix lung cancer.
OK you enjoyed your life now face the inevitable.

I am in no way suggesting we treat one race or religion in a different way.
But as a group we can not keep up with science and pay to keep everyone alive for ever.
Hey if you got the money in the bank and want to pay for the surgery go right ahead.
But expecting the government to pay for it; or making insurance cost for everyone so high that no one can afford it; because we want everything known to science covered is just going to far.
Heck if you want insurance that covers everything go for it but you alone bear the cost.

I as a adult should be able to make a decision knowing my wife has had a hysterectomy I do not need child birth coverage.
I as a adult should be able to not carry cancer coverage if I so choose.

I say enjoy your life.
Smoke cigarettes; drink cokes; and eat red meat full of growth hormones.
Kill your body before your mind has you pooping your pants like a baby.
But accept the fact that you will die one day no matter how much health care money you throw at it.

John I will heartily agree with paying your own way for health care. That would self regulate many of the problems. You and I both know that ship sailed when company provide health care first came out. That started the slide because the consumer of the service did not have to pay for it directly. So that removed the self throttling of care by the consumer.

So until the entire system crashes I do not think we will see much improvement in the delivery of care. There will be new discoveries but the system will have to crash and be rebuilt before we get anything better.

It's not just that old people that are living longer. My nephew was born with a bad liver 19 years ago. He was on a waiting list for a new one but it didn't look like he would get one in time. A new procedure was developed where a piece of a donor's was used. He was one of there first to have it done and today he is a heathy young man. My wife at 64 had breast cancer. She is cancer free for one year now and hopefully forever living a full life. I'll gladly pay my premiums for the care we have gotten through the years with no complaints.

A good mental health doctor can get you to thinking right and help keep you from going crazy for a while longer for what $ you may have.

John, I think I know what you mean about placing value on life. At 74 I'm still enjoying life, but I realize that there's not going to be much of it left. My grandfathers died at 60, my father at 76 and my brother at 73. I don't really fear death; I don't even think about it much actually. What I do fear is being old and helpless---at that point it's no longer life, it's just organic endurance. One of my little prayers is "Lord, if I'm stricken, leave me at least one good trigger finger." If I can be fixed, fine, but if not I don't want to have to be hooked up with wires and hoses and pumps just to stay at room temperature. I have a living will that expresses that.

I've told my family that if I'm ever in a terrible accident or suffer a massive stroke or heart attack where I am in a coma, let me go peacefully. I don't want to have to die but once, and there's no point spending thousands of dollars to preserve something that no longer functions. I've thought about getting a tattoo on my chest that reads, "Don't try to be a hero, Doc."

My mother was 89, in the hospital with stomach cancer. She told the Dr.s,"There is a time to be born and a time to dye". (I think that was in the good book) Then she checked herself out of the hospital and said take me home, that's where I want to dye. And that's where she died, not in a hospital and not in a nursing home.

All of my grandparents ate what they wanted. drank what they wanted and smoked or chewed what they wanted. Every one of them lived to be over 80. The difference was that they ate what they grew and they were very active and physically fit , at least until they were 65 or so.
Personally I prefer quality over quantity. I'm at that age that I'm starting to slow down. I can't imagine not being able to work and hope I die before that happens. In the last few years I've seen several family members that lived well into their 80's and 90's but they spent each day planning their next doctor visit. To me that is a dismal outlook. I would rather die today as have that kind of life. The farther we get from believing in an afterlife the harder we cling to this life. I'm thankful that I believe in afterlife.

Well said!

I agree with you.

No quite a few people think the same way. My mother was 83 when she died had a DNR. Always the joker the last thing she said to me was. Did you feed my cats. My dad was 73 when he died. Doing what he loved being a farmer. Always told me. No one gets off this planet alive so why worry about dieing

This reminds me of some guys I worked with when I was flying. They talked about their special health food and gym memberships and exercise equipment, yet none of them would walk the half mile from the parking lot to the terminal. They rode the employee bus!

As for me, I always walked until they tore up the sidewalks for construction. Even walking I could get to the crew lounge faster than the bus riders.

My wife, at age 46, had rare, aggressive breast cancer, was treated and is doing well 16 years later.

I would have checked out a long time ago without surgery, a simple thing, appendicitis. I know what they mean when they say you feel the cold hand of death. I was so sick and so cold they piled so many blankets on that they felt heavy on me but I could not get warm.

My mother degraded to a nursing home inhabitant. About 6 months of that and one day she said she was tired of all the crap, the body dying piece by piece, this quit working and that quit working and on and on. She said she wanted to die and end it all. One week later at 86 she was gone! The mind can do strange things to the body!

Yes Mark the mind is a powerful part of our body.

My wife's uncle died.
His wife was old but in good health.
She went to his funeral and burial a few days later.
Went home and told her daughter she was going to lay down for a nap.
The daughter went to check on her a few hours later and she was dead.

Happened in my family too.

The senario:

Seven kids with my dad being oldest.

One of the daughters marries a guy.

Another marries a guy who is killed in a car accident early in their marriage. Daughter makes it on her own and raises their two daughters for maybe 30 years.

First daughter mentioned dies.

Husband and second daughter mentioned do whatever and get married. Stay married for another 20 years (numbers are guesses).

Husband dies.

Next day second daughter dies.

Amazing!

What a bunch of old history whiners. Get on and enjoy life.

I'm 64 and I plan to go another 30 years. After that I'll think about getting my projects done so they are finished for when the big time comes. I'll report back in 30 years to let you know if the plan worked. LOL