I am almost twice the age of Jack Gilbert in his poem, “It is Difficult to Speak of the Night,” where he bemoans the onset of middle age, yet finds unexpected new growth as well. For myself, I go in and out of darkness, some days finding joy in new learning and the flowering of my old roses, and some days finding exhaustion at the end of the day and not much else.
I’ve managed my own physical decline with mostly high spirits. Now that my partner has handed over most of his autonomy and responsibility to me, the joint burden is sometimes too much, or it seems that way. It is time to find additional resources to help us. That falls to me as well. As one of my dear friends said to me today, “Your job now is to manage resources, not to provide them.”
I have been the provider for awhile. I give my partner injections, drive him to medical appointments — three a few days ago — two in Oakland and one in San Francisco, keep track of his medications and handle his finances. At one of his appointments a nurse gave him what I now know is the standard memory test. She said I was allowed in the room but couldn’t help him cheat. She meant that to be funny, I know. What she didn’t know was that I would not be tempted to cheat as I had begged his primary care physician to provide the test in the first place.
He did surprisingly well on the standard calculations done in the moment — creating a clock and displaying the right time, counting backward by 7s, speaking back a list of five words. What he didn’t do was remember those words 10 minutes later, though the nurse had told him she would ask for them. This is the crux of where we are now. He seems mostly fine in the moment, so several of my friends tell me I’m exaggerating his loss of memory (as does his primary care physician, by the way). It is remembering what he said or I said 10 minutes later. That is gone.
Of my own challenges, memory is one, but so far, a minor one. I have taken to falling lately — twice in the last six weeks. I must have strong bones because I have not broken any even though I landed on hard surfaces both times. In the first instance I missed a bottom step to stairs I use every day. In the second, it was an immovable umbrella stand holding no umbrella. This is worrisome. I tell myself these falls happen because I’m not paying attention. The results have been pain and bruising but nothing more serious. We’ll see if it happens again. I did write to my doc about it.
I’m still running a monthly group about aging, and finding speakers to inform and encourage us over 55ers. I’m still teaching a course I’ve taught before and creating a new course for the reopening of an outlet closed since the beginning of the pandemic. I find joy in these pursuits. I find joy in being in any learning environment with others.
I do not swim anymore. I do not do water aerobics. I do practice yoga and walk more than 6 miles a week. But my pace is slower. That’s OK. I see more of the world at my current pace and appreciate its loveliness.
With each loss — capability, relationship, change — I have to accept and recalibrate. So far this has been doable, though not without sadness and sometimes anger. When that is no longer true, I have a long family history of ending life intentionally. I’m not afraid of that.
