"I'm so weak and very tired," she said as we headed to the ER. "I'm just so tired," she mumbled as we got her onto the gurney. "I feel like I just can't keep going," she moaned when she realized that the ER was packed full on this rainy fall evening. "I don't think I will ever get seen," she sighed as we made our way to the cubicle where they would, eventually, evaluate her condition. She did perk up when she realized she had a "birds eye" view of the station where the nurses congregated. She did perk up when that cute young doctor came around. In fact, when asked how she felt, she might have actually smiled and said, "I feel sh)+y, that's why I'm here." After the nurses, aides, and doctor had left the room, she returned to her real real, deep concern that her body was just plain worn out! While the medical staff felt there was nothing they could offer to "fix" her condition, she readily accepted a "bag" of saline solution to help "perk her up a bit."
8 comments:
This hit home as I am watching my parents age and feeling the effects of aging myself. Sometimes the journey isn't so pleasant. What a true sentence, "It's hard to watch sparks changing to charred embers; yet, that is what happens to all of us "lucky" enough to grow old."
I love the Irish saying yet I understand getting old may not be fun especially when the body is saying one thing and the mind something completely different. I think we all will be able to appreciate what you wrote if not today then tomorrow. Thanks for sharing.
My mom will have her eightieth birthday in December...even though she is still very active, even working part-time, she has started talking about how she is slowing down, talking more about aches and pains, talking about how turning eighty is really bothering her. I like the Irish saying...I will try to take it to heart, because I have to admit, turning sixty this year kind of got to me. I think the saying would make my mom mad!
Aging is not for wimps! When it is my turn to cross the slippery log I have a list of questions for St Peter - 1. Why wasn't the energy we had as children better rationed so we would have more when we aged?
What a bittersweet blessing. Yes, we can all be thankful to have lived as long as we have... but the aging process is still a drag.
I also try to remind myself how much younger we feel than those hit our ages even 50 years ago.
As I sit in grad class and the students are in their 20's, the teacher is making comments about how young they are and she exclaims that she is in her 40's. I sit pensively, thinking about my 50 years straddling the fence of feeling depressed or just thinking you are only as old as you feel. Life is to short to worry about my age.
I think being old is a drag because you just know that so many years are in the past, not in the future. But I do love the Irish saying-so true. A friend's son died this year at age 46, a drug induced heart attack-he won't live to be old. Thanks for the thoughtful post.
You have captured this growing old(er) so well. My Dad just turned 80 last month and this reminds me of the increasing trips for medical services with him. As Elsie said I am starting to see it myself, too. What a good reminder that after all WE are still here. Ever onward...
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