If given a choice between Life and Death, I choose Life!

If given a choice between Life and Death, I choose Life.
With these deaths in the family, my nights have not been peaceful. I try to think positive thoughts at night, but over the past several days, my thoughts have been with the families of the dearly departed. I keep sensing their heartbreak and I worry for my own family. I love my husband, children and grandchildren so much. I can't imagine the depth of the heartbreak that my relatives are experiencing.
What is particularly disheartening is the fact that both died so young due, at least in part, to diabetes. My husband has diabetes. My sisters have diabetes. My mother (who passed) had diabetes. And I have to be careful so I do not become a diabetic.
The night before last I had an episode. There are so many people at work sick with that bad flu. So Monday, after work, I decided to make old fashioned  chicken soup to help my family avoid illness. Since I had to work overtime, I didn't start cooking until 5 and dinner wasn't ready until 8. I never eat after 7 due to my acid reflux. Yet, my family and I had a late supper. I suffered for it later.
At 2 am, I woke up gasping and choking. I couldn't breathe. My acid reflux caused the soup to come back up on me and it caught in my throat. Half asleep, I tried to catch my breath, but it wouldn't come. It couldn't come. I sat straight up. I managed to squeak out my husband's name. He shot up and grabbed me by my shoulders and shook me, calling my name, "Dee...Dee.!  What's wrong. What's wrong." It was dark. He couldn't see my face. But as he shook me, my breathe came back. I could breathe again. My throat was raw from choking for a breath. I was still wheezing. My husband said, "What happened." I just wheezed, "I'm ok. I'm ok."
I got up and went to the bathroom. I coughed up the phlegm in my throat and drank a glass of water. I went back to bed.
My husband asked, "Are you ok?" He was still worried.
I laid back down. My heart was pounding in my chest. My ears were ringing. My throat was sore and raw. I was so tired. I tried to sleep. My husband kept rubbing my arm, checking on me.
My heart kept pounding out of my chest all night and I was still tired in the morning.
I stayed home from work yesterday and today. I couldn't eat yesterday until late afternoon and I've barely eaten today, though I do feel much better now.
All the while this has been going on, my thoughts are with my two sisters who drove out to California for the funeral of my niece next week. They are taking on so much more on than I have. They have their own families, yet they are in California giving their shoulders and reaching their arms around our family in California. The suffering of their family over the passing of a beautiful, 18 year old child, it's so much for them to bear. My thoughts and prayers are with them. I wish I could hug them all as they grieve and find peace.
I am grateful for my family. I love my husband, my sons, my grandsons, my daughter in law, my sisters, brothers and my extended family. I want so much to protect them all from harm.
If given a choice between Life and Death, I do choose Life. I do choose Peace. I do choose Love.

Remember...You Must Die -- What will happen as all the Baby Boomers enter their Golden Years?

I haven't written a blog for a few days because I am out of town visiting my brother. He is in the last stages of ALS and is dying. We don't know if he has a few days or weeks to live, but the doctors tell us he doesn't have much time. ALS is a particularly cruel disease. You may know it as Lou Gehrig's disease. From a layman's point of view, you continue to lose muscle control over your own body until you die.

About a year and a half ago my brother was perfectly healthy. He had retired and he and his companion were living the typical retiree's American Dream of traveling around the country in a 5th wheel and travel trailer. Out of nowhere he started seeing some symptoms. He started dropping things, then tripping or falling. He is a widower with four daughters. At his daughters' insistence, he underwent a complete physical. He is a veteran and went to the VA for his physical. They diagnosed ALS. As the disease progressed, he began losing more muscle control. He stopped traveling. Soon, he couldn't lift things and stopped walking and became confined to a wheel chair. At the insistence of his daughters, he moved in with his oldest daughter so she and her son could care for him. He lost more and more control over his body. He went on a breathing ventilator. Soon he was bed ridden and relied on machines not only for breathing but for eating and for urinary and bowel movements.

He was fortunate that he had proper insurance and was well covered. Not only the VA, but Medicare and supplemental. I shudder to think what he would have done without his medical coverage. He is on home care and his bedroom/bath were updated to care for his needs. His only joy now, besides seeing his family, is watching television on a big screen TV with surround sound. He stopped using a computer months ago.

It is difficult visiting him. He can barely talk. He has tubes in his arms, across his body and in several orifices. He has to have air pumped into his lungs to help him talk. His daughter has to come in, pump him with air, and he is able to speak in short gasps. He says it hurts him to talk because he can't breathe when he talks.
Before he became so disabled, he used to say, "I'm not sick, I am disabled." You see, he has full mental capacity. It is just his body giving out.

I used to think that my father and mother had it rough at the end. My dad, at 79, had a stroke a few years prior to his death. Afterwards, he had the mind of a 3 year old. However his body was fully functional and he was able to walk and feed himself his last few years, though my mother had to change and bathe him. My mother died last year at 93. She had those tiny mini-strokes six months prior to her death and had trouble with her memory and she became bedridden then died. I also had 2 older brothers who died. One died at 66, though he had just been diagnosed with leukemia, he actually died from an aneurysm that burst. His death was sudden. I had another brother who died from years of lost hope. His death was also short in coming. We were shocked by both brothers' deaths.

Today, thinking about all of these deaths in my family over the last several years has caused me to be very contemplative. Death is inevitable. Sometimes, I think we in the U.S. don't think about it enough. We are all going to die. If death is a natural part of life, then we should stop to consider our future destiny and document our wishes. The use of the term "death panels" is absolutely ridiculous. The doctors and nurses have talked to my brother's family extensively about my brother's last days, hospice, nursing, making choices about life and death. They have spent much time talking about his options. You have to be able to discuss your options at his point in his life.

In meeting with many family members here this week, I also find that three more of my nephews are heading off to war. One is currently in Iraq - his 3rd tour, another is on on his way to Afghanistan - after 2 tours in Iraq, and one who is in training is going overseas in a few weeks. Additionally, I spoke with some of their younger brothers and sisters who are planning on enlisting or going into ROTC. Many are planning careers in the military. Service to our country and the economy are major factors in their decisions.

Watching the news, I see that so many national/global issues personally impact my family and most families across America. In thinking about this all week, it is absolutely clear to me that we should all be supportive of:
1. Universal Health care with a Public Option so that Insurance is affordable and provided to all Americans. Pre-existing conditions should NEVER be a factor.
2. The Wars in the Middle East and the Economy: the state of the economy is causing more and more young people to go into the military, not only for their service to our country, but for economic reasons.

Readers: We need to talk about life and death. Death is part of the natural order of things. Tell me your thoughts of death. I grieve for my brother's illness and pain, not for the natural order of life and death. I grieve for those who do not have enough health care coverage. I grieve for those who do not have enough care in their hearts to want others to receive proper health care. I grieve for our young people going off to war whose lives are being cut short. While I support our President in sending more troops to Afghanistan, I continue to believe our involvement in Iraq was wrong. However, I still grieve for the soldiers who are dying every, every day and pray for the safety of my nephews.

And readers, please do not send condolences or say you are sorry to hear about the illnesses and deaths in my family. I received several nice messages from you when my mother and brother passed away. I ask instead for your ideas on how we can talk about the inevitability of death and how on earth are we going to be able to cope with the needs of all of the Baby Boomers as they (including me and mine) approach our Golden Years. Yes. We are all going to die. Yes, many of us will need extensive health care in our Golden Years. This care will range from days to months to years; from occasional to daily on-hands care by medical professionals. This is the reality. We all need to be thinking and planning for our own futures and do each of us want our children to go through what my brother's daughters are going through right now? Or do you want to go to a nursing home? Are you prepared to give up all of your worldly goods for hospice care? Or, instead will you live in denial and say "No! That will not happen to me."

When I was a child I thought as a child: "Only old people die. They close their eyes and go to sleep."

Today: "The Boomers will all die. Some will require years of hands-on medical treatment by family and medical care providers."

Death, Life and Heaven

My brother died late last week. He was only 62 years old. I loved my brother, but I know he had a very rough life. His life didn’t start out that way though. He was born the fourth son and the sixth child in our 10 children family home. We all started out the same. We were hard working migrant laborers. We had a father and mother that loved us. They focused on building within each of us a work ethic that would help us become successful in America. Every summer we worked in the fruit/vegetable fields harvesting crops. Every Fall through Spring we attended school to complete our education so we could achieve the American Dream.

We all faced challenges. We were minorities in a majority white Michigan. From the beginning, we were the one “Mexican” family on the block. Teasing, chasing, bullying were the norm vs the anomaly. My brother faced it worse than most. He had an added factor. He was also overweight. This brought additional teasing.

Nevertheless, he was a very smart person and always did his best. I think he had his heart broken a few times, though he never dwelt on any negative experiences.

After he graduated from school and found his first job, he met a girl and married her. They had a beautiful daughter. The marriage only lasted only a few years. They mutually decided to divorce.

He came into his own after his divorce. He started advancing at his job and he lost weight. He became very handsome and dapper. Everyone said he looked like Freddie Prinze. It was the late seventies. Chico and the Man was a popular TV show and my brother was getting a lot of attention. Being the seventies, he started to dabble in pot and other miscellaneous feel good drugs. I knew a few people who did the same, but my boyfriend (now husband) and I were not into that kind of stuff so we drifted away from my brother and his crowd. By that time, my husband and I were married and I started advancing in my own career. We moved away from our hometown. After that, I only saw my brother once in a while when we came home for visits.

My brother married again and had two more children, a boy and a girl. After a few years, his partying went a little out of control. His marriage broke up. His new ex-wife moved to another state. He paid child support but rarely saw his kids. A few years later he lost his job. He didn’t give up his partying. Soon, he was drifting from job to job, usually in construction or as a handyman. He lost his house and later moved in with my parents.

None of my brothers and sisters were happy about this at first. However as my parents grew older, it was helpful to have him there. He became a very good caretaker of our parents. After our Dad died in 93, he became our mother’s sole caretaker and companion. In the last few years of her life, we were grateful to him especially the last six months when she was totally disabled and suffered from dementia.

Our mother died in January 2008. He became very depressed. I think he felt lost without mom. He had previously stopped his partying ways and now with mom gone, he just stayed home and seemed to give up. His health started to falter. He had diabetes and always seemed tired. He was only 62 when he died last Friday of natural causes. I suspect the actual cause was a broken heart. His two youngest children came to the funeral. They had been estranged from their dad for years, but they were so heartbroken by his death. It was just gut wrenching to see their tears.

My oldest brother (69) is in very poor health. He has ALS and is losing most of his muscle control. He doesn’t have much longer to live. He is in Michigan and was not able to travel due to his health so he did not attend the funeral.

The rosary/wake and the funeral Mass were all emotions. Afterwards, the immediate family gathered together just to talk. Then everyone began going home. My sister and I drove our oldest sister (68) to the airport. In years past, we would just drop her at the terminal entrance, but this time, we parked. I carried her luggage and guided her to the counter then to airport security.

My sister fell last year and this impacted her ability to walk on her own. She now walks with a cane. She moves so slowly. I remembered when we were young and we would run and laugh together. Now, she was not only fragile, she was elderly. I wondered how much longer we would have her with us.

I think I needed the five hour drive back home just so I could think about what happened over the previous few days. I didn’t cry much. I’m afraid to cry for fear I will break down. The few times I almost cried was during the wake and when his children cried.

I thought about my brother and his short life. My parents and another brother were dead too. My oldest brother and sister may soon follow. I remember putting together easel boards with so many pictures of my brother with our family. I know my brother did not achieve his dreams.

When I came home, I hugged my youngest son. I held my husband’s hand for a long, time. It felt good to just hang on to them for a little while. I love my husband and children so much. My husband and I talked for a little while about the week but I didn’t go into too much detail, just that it was sad and I was worried about my oldest sister.

My husband is bowling tonight and I started to look at my email and my blog. I decided to let my blog wait one more day before I jump back into it. Instead, I decided to put my thoughts and feelings down on paper. Life is just so damn short. It isn’t fair. What happened to hopes and dreams and plans for the future? Death is always there. That is a guarantee. If not death, then there is always debilitating disease, especially when you get older. How unfair.

I am a little mad at myself. Maybe I could have been a better sister. Maybe I could have been a little more understanding. Maybe I could have visited more. It is too late for that now.
Then I think he lived his own life the way he wanted to live it. Maybe he is happier now. Maybe he did get what he wanted. He did believe in Heaven.