None of us has time to be sick
By AMY NEFF ROTH
Healthy Living
I went to the dentist on a Tuesday. I finally made it back to work the next Thursday.
I’d expected to leave the dentist’s office with numb gums but no lasting impact. I didn’t expect a gum infection.
Between intense pain, maximum doses of prescription narcotics and several days without eating or drinking much of anything, I barely got up until Monday.
My life – deadlines at work, plans with friends, household chores, answering e-mails, teaching Sunday school – all got put on hold.
It’s a little frightening when we’re so out of control of our lives. We plan, plan, plan our days, writing endless notes on our calendars, but one little misplaced germ can wipe all those plans away.
A friend recently got so sick that she had to go to the emergency room twice. When I called to see how she was doing, she just kept saying, “I don’t have time to be sick.”
Who does? And even with all the time in the world, who wants to lie around in misery, with a roiling stomach, rattling breath or a raspy throat? No one, of course.
That’s at least part of the reason why we now vaccinate young, healthy children against the chicken pox and healthy adults against the flu. Neither group is likely to die or suffer permanent damage if infected, but who can afford the time off work to care for a sick child or stay in bed for a week?
At least, though, these disruptions are temporary. My gum feels fine, I’m off narcotics and I’m once again well fed and well hydrated. I’m back on schedule (except when my car ran out of gas the other day, of course.) Sometimes, though, illnesses strike just as suddenly, but don’t go away; lives never get back on schedule.
That’s what happened to my grandmother. I was in junior high school when she got shingles. My mother dropped everything to help her mother through the painful illness. In time, the rash did clear up and the pain did go away. But Mom Mom was never the same.
She got weaker, no longer driving and seldom going out. Her hair thinned to the point that she bought a wig to preserve her vanity. And she lost most of her hearing.
Mom Mom used to sit around at family gatherings, soaking in the sight of all her loved one’s faces, but dismally remarking on how she wished she could hear everyone. We would hold one-on-one conversations with her, shouting until she could hear, but that wasn’t the same as hearing all the byplay among her children and grandchildren. She sometimes said she’d rather go blind than deaf.
I had always adored my grandmother, who lived in a world of antiques, china teapots and church work. She had traveled around the world with my grandfather before I was born, and I loved looking at all the exotic treasures in her house. In elementary school, when I started writing poetry, she encouraged me enthusiastically.
But just as I should have started growing into a more grown-up relationship with her – an exchange of ideas and interests – shingles threw up a roadblock.
A few years later came a stroke, and she moved into a nursing home.
She wasn’t paralyzed. She could still speak. But her mind drifted away. We’d catch glimpses of the Mom Mom we knew from time to time, but mostly her intellect was lost somewhere in the fog.
All the things I longed to share with her – things I learned in college classes, my travels in Europe – remained unspoken beyond few succinct details.
Mom Mom lived, but I couldn’t really “access” her. And my loss started with shingles, almost 10 years before she actually died.
Just think how much more quality time we might have had without shingles. With the gift of hindsight every conversation over a china pot of tea seems precious, every memory something for the scrapbook. Mom Mom didn’t have the option of getting immunized against the shingles. Today’s seniors do.
Unlike my grandmother, most shingles patients fully recover. But still, why gamble if you don’t have to? Get the shot. Catch up on all your other immunizations, too, including the pneumococcal pneumonia vaccine and an annual flu shot. Live life on your schedule for as long as you can.
Amy Neff Roth writes monthly in her Second Opinion column about health issues that hit close to home. E-mail: aroth@uticaod.com |
