Reality Check
Life truly has a way of putting things in perspective. After the flurry of seizures that kept me awake on Wednesday night and the pressure headaches that followed yesterday, I started to fall into the "pitiful me" trap. It doesn't happen to me very often, thankfully, but when it does, watch out! And just to make sure that I don't languish in the trap too long, in steps real life to kick me in the butt and remind me that even on my worst day, there are others whose situations are far worse than mine. In this case, I've got two examples, both of them my uncles.
My family has been on a death watch since September. One of my uncles, my mother's youngest brother, has COPD and lung cancer. He's only 14 years older than I, a fact that brings home to me the fragility of life and how brief our time can be. Figuring that he would beat the draft at its own game, my uncle joined the Air Force during the Vietnam War. He came back a changed man, one that it took all of us a while to become comfortable with. Not long after he returned from the war, he and his wife moved to Florida where he worked construction at Disneyworld. I was lucky enough to attend the grand opening of the park, thanks to him. Now, according to my cousin who called this afternoon, he has just a few days left. Hospice care has come to help take care of him at home.
Bad news, sort of like my seizures, seems to come in flurries. With one uncle dying in Florida and the family awaiting the inevitable, I got word this afternoon that my great uncle -- my maternal grandmother's last remaining sibling -- had yet another heart attack. He's been in the hospital for about a week now after suffering two heart attacks. His kidneys began to fail, probably because he is also a diabetic who is recovering from chemo for prostate cancer, so the triple bypass surgery needed to fix his heart had to be put on hold for a while. That was, until today. He has now been airlifted from Elmira to Columbia University in the Big Apple where he will have emergency bypass surgery. What the outcome will be is anyone's guess at this point, and I still haven't heard.
I may be feeling miserable, but I certainly don't have much to complain about considering. . .
My family has been on a death watch since September. One of my uncles, my mother's youngest brother, has COPD and lung cancer. He's only 14 years older than I, a fact that brings home to me the fragility of life and how brief our time can be. Figuring that he would beat the draft at its own game, my uncle joined the Air Force during the Vietnam War. He came back a changed man, one that it took all of us a while to become comfortable with. Not long after he returned from the war, he and his wife moved to Florida where he worked construction at Disneyworld. I was lucky enough to attend the grand opening of the park, thanks to him. Now, according to my cousin who called this afternoon, he has just a few days left. Hospice care has come to help take care of him at home.
Bad news, sort of like my seizures, seems to come in flurries. With one uncle dying in Florida and the family awaiting the inevitable, I got word this afternoon that my great uncle -- my maternal grandmother's last remaining sibling -- had yet another heart attack. He's been in the hospital for about a week now after suffering two heart attacks. His kidneys began to fail, probably because he is also a diabetic who is recovering from chemo for prostate cancer, so the triple bypass surgery needed to fix his heart had to be put on hold for a while. That was, until today. He has now been airlifted from Elmira to Columbia University in the Big Apple where he will have emergency bypass surgery. What the outcome will be is anyone's guess at this point, and I still haven't heard.
I may be feeling miserable, but I certainly don't have much to complain about considering. . .