An old story that came to my mind
this morning: a man asked his friend with a terminal disease, “How does it feel
to know you are dying?” The friend responded, “How do you feel to think you are
not?”
How you cope with terminal disease
depends on how you feel about battling dragons. You can meet the dragon head
on, or you can turn tail and run. Fight or flight. It depends on the kind of
person you are.
Alzheimer’s is a big, ugly
fire-breathing dragon of a disease. It is a terminal disease that can take a
decade or more to reach its ultimate conclusion. That’s entirely too long to be
in “dying” mode.
As if having a terminal disease
isn’t enough of a problem, people often have more than one potentially fatal
condition. Heart disease, diabetes, kidney disease, cancer…the list goes on and
on. While you are battling the big dragon, smaller potentially dangerous
dragons are coming at you from every side.
In real life, you battle diseases as
if you were fighting those mythical dragons, that is, one at a time. Otherwise,
it is overwhelming.
When Jim developed other medical
problems, we dealt with them as they came. I decided it was best to address
each issue as it arrived. My thoughts were to keep him as healthy and mobile as
possible.
Alzheimer’s is a disease that
affects every person in the family. It may affect them in different ways. One
person steps up to be the caregiver—usually a spouse or child. Some may
withdraw while others go into overdrive to provide support for the primary
caregiver. Then, there’s Mr. or Ms. Know-it-All who don’t really want to do
anything but tell everyone else how to do it. Yes, the personalities of those
involved can be quite challenging.
Ultimately, the biggest choice is
whether to give up or go slay the dragon. When you give up, you waste precious
time. Chronic illness of any type becomes a dragon that needs to be slain.
If you look at what you still have
instead of what you’ve lost, you can begin to enjoy life. Cherish those little
moments of joy, and make memories. You don’t want to lose a decade of your life
seeing only the doom and gloom of a terminal disease. Become a dragon slayer!
Copyright © December 2017 by L.S.
Fisher
#ENDALZ
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