A lot of people start realizing their own mortality when their parents die. They suddenly realize that Mom or Dad is only 20 or 25 years older than them, and that's when either the midlife crisis happens or they straighten up, fly right, and start treating the body like it's an investment rather than a nasty carpet at a New York party. And before you say "Ew", think about some of the things you have done and put into your body over the years....even the CLEANEST living among you has scarfed half a dozen hot-out-of-the-oil Krispy Kreme's at 1:00 a.m. You know you have. Don't lie. And if it wasn't that, it was something else equally disgusting.
I didn't have a midlfe crisis, though, when Mom died in 1999. I mean, all of us kids smoked tobacco at that time, and since Mom was dying of lung cancer brought on by cigarettes, we all stood outside on the porch late one night while she lay inside dying, puffing away on our coffin nails and swearing that, when this was all over, we were going to quit. Out of the three of us, as far as I know I'm the only one who actually did, and it took me three more years to do it. To be fair, I had a good streak of 8 weeks clean going on September 11th, 2001, but Dad was having heart surgery that day and gave his cigarettes to me to hide from my stepmother. After the 2nd building came down the patch came off and I lit one up.
But on July 8th, 2002 I got up, showered, and went to my first day at my new job where I wasn't allowed to smoke until after I left work for the day because my boss was six months into a nine-month high-risk pregnancy and the smell of tobacco smoke made her hurl major. Best thing that's ever happened to me. I wish it could happen to everyone I love who smokes.
Because, in the long run, what people don't get is you aren't just hurting yourself. You aren't. You think you are, you yell loud about smoker's rights and argue about the real impact of second-hand smoke, but in reality, what you don't see is where it hurts your family the most. You don't see their faces as they wait in that hospital waiting room, waiting for you to get out of surgery, or wait for their fifteen minutes of visit time to you in the ICU, waiting for the doctor to finish his examination...waiting, worrying, crying, heart breaking...putting their lives on hold because you could not stop yourself from destroying your own body. They make excuses to their employers, their spouses, their kids so that they can sit there and wait for news, good or bad, about you. So that they can pray for you. It's what you do when you love someone.
This has been a hard week for me. I hurt my back on Tuesday, not at the lake, or tubing or any number of other great things I could have been doing that, had I hurt my back I could at least say "Yeah, but I had FUN" like I did last summer when I destroyed my knee, but doing something simple...bending over to get something out of a drawer in my office. Yep, that's it...I bent over and it felt like I had been shot in my lower back. Or what I imagine getting shot feels like anyway. And I've been in pain constantly ever since.
I don't do "pain pills"...Darvocet, Hydrocodone, Tylox...ugh. Anything off the store shelf that has "PM" after it puts me into a 12 hour coma, so you can imagine what these pills do to me. I take them only as a last resort, and only when I can just no longer stand the pain. And in addition to putting me in a coma, these pills also have the lovely side effect of making me nauseous. In a coma, and throwing up...yep, I think a number of rock stars have died that way over the years. So "pain pills" are a last resort option, only when I have a babysitter that can make sure I don't aspirate in my sleep.
OTC stuff helps a little, I'm taking two Aleve's every 12 hours on the dot...and believe me I know when that last hour is coming up.
Doesn't matter though. It's nothing compared to what one of my favorite people in the world is going through. Early in the year he ended up in the hospital for tests, and it was determined that he had had a heart attack...at 48. He had been diagnosed with diabetes a few years before as well. Recently he started feeling fatigued, then sick, then REALLY sick and ended up back in the hospital, only this time it's antibiotic-resistant strep, aka MRSA. He's been going through some major treatment to combat this, including drugs that are genetically developed just for him. However, the drugs are so hard on the body because this stuff is so hard to kill that he's been left bedridden, in pain and barely able to move.
Last night he told me that he was dying, and that he felt that he probably didn't have another year. I argued with him, told him to FIGHT, that he could fight this and he could win. I said all of the things to him that I would have said to my sister had I gotten the opportunity. What I got back from him really scared me, because he sounds so depressed, so....like he's just given up.
I don't understand why people give up. I don't understand why someone would choose to leave this life after such a short time here rather than stay and see what happens next. I'm pissed off that I'm almost fifty, that I only have maybe 30 or 40 years at the most! And that's if I'm lucky. Because looking at my family, there's a better-than-average chance that the big c or another debilitating illness will find me in the next ten years. Cancer is rampant on both sides of my family. My Dad has COPD, and while most of that is due to 50+ years of smoking and working as a paint and body repairman, inhaling dust, fiberglass, paint and God-only-knows-what chemicals into his lungs all those years, some of it is inherited as well. We all three had some sort of lung ailments as children, and on my part I developed asthma as an adult. My sister died of lung cancer. I have aunts and uncles who have died of lung and breast cancer. Mother, Father, Sister, Aunts, Uncles...So I know that it's not a matter of if, it's a matter of when.
I'm aware that suffering is involved here. I know my friend, this person that should have been my brother, I know he's in a great deal of pain. And I'm hoping that this round of medication will cure the infection raging in his system and that his words are all just the depression brought on by boredom, being in bed, being fucked up on pain pills, being broke, and feeling useless. Because of all things, hope is something that I can never let go of. Hope for him, hope for myself, for John, for Gareth, for my kids and their kids. Hope for my cousins who, like me, are so vulnerable. Some have already started the fight and are winning!
I know some very little of what good friend is feeling...only a very small part..because I've spent most of this last week sitting here in front of my computer, in the only chair in the house comfortable to me, in the only position comfortable to me, unable to do some of the most basic chores around here like change litter boxes, or even something as simple as feeding the cats (haven't been able to bend over or lift very well). John has taken on the entire burden without a word of reproach, and I can't say enough kind words to him about that. Gareth has been so understanding, despite the fact that he has had to run the store by himself most of the week. And I know I haven't been easy to live with...I've been grouchy and short and petulant and...bitchy. Because I hurt. And now, after talking to my dear friend, I feel like skum. I have no reason for complaint.
My "midlife crisis" as it were is that I worry about death coming and me not being ready for it. I don't know if I'll ever be ready for it. There is so much I still want to do, that I want to see, that I want to BE. I want to travel. I want to see where my sister lived the last 1/4 of her life. I want to visit New York City again. I want to watch my granddaughter and grandson graduate college. And I want to LIVE every day to it's fullest. I hope that I don't ever give up, that I don't ever give in, and that I don't ever say "at least if I'm dead, I can rest". Because that, to me, would be the ultimate tragedy.
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