My perspective on aging has definitely changed since starting FW in a geriatric setting. Thoughts about aging to me used to be a 50% scared of what changes aging would have in store for the future & the other 50% of my mind was I would just be really happy to have as many days on this planet as possible. Like most people I would love to live a long, healthy, productive & fulfilling life. After to being exposed to the different circumstances of age related changes & health related changes in a SNF things have changed. Time obviously should never be taken for granted as it is apparent no one is immune from a life changing impairment. To see people who are impacted with health issues either rapidly of or slowly has really opened my eyes to the possibilities that come along with “getting older”.
This brings me to the second point of what has “the biggest impact on how one ages?” In my opinion it would primarily have to be environment. Ones environment has everything to do with cultural habits i.e. some people never go to the doctor for regular checkups, financial reasons, the resources available to them medically or otherwise are lacking. To start with ones environment it would include diet & exercise. Some people are raised to eat the food from the land that they work hard to raise like in rural communities others are raised with a Happy Meal & a Xbox game, while still others are raised with a diet passed done from generation to generation of very starchy & a lot of fried foods. The habits that are ingrained in each of us from early on do last a lifetime, some good others not so good for the big picture of healthy living. Also when it comes to generational habits some people never go to the doctor, never get immunizations, and never go to the dentist. Alarming to most but to some people the doctor is a waste of hard earned money & if something isn’t obviously broke there is now apparent need to be fixed.
There are also some people that don’t have the financial ability to have regular checkups in their life that would go under preventative health measures. In a story done by PBS it is reported that “44 MILLION Americans don’t have insurance & 38 MILLION have inadequate health insurance.” That is almost 1/3 of Americans! Holy cow that is alarming but it is the facts of life. To find out more the link is posted here => http://www.pbs.org/healthcarecrisis/uninsured.html No matter what the process or road each of us goes down the biggest picture of all is to hopefully, live well & BE HAPPY with the time we have. It does no good to ponder today the possible ill happenings of tomorrow. WE can do things different to attempt a healthy & long life its just a matter of changing up some not so great habits.
No comments:
Post a Comment