Intro

For those of you who don"t know me, I am a 63 year old woman in the process of dying from copd. I have smoked for over 50 years and have no intention of quitting. Yes, I do know that this is not the smart reasonable thing to do, but I like to smoke, never could drink and am now at the stage where movement is difficult at the best of times-smoking is my hobby. I'm not looking for pity. All of my ills are caused by my behaviour.

I love being 63! I like getting older. I'm much smarter than I used to be, and my reactions are slower,but clearer.

I'm starting this blog because people don't like to talk about death and dying. It's whats happening to me now, and because I'm limited physically it has center stage for me. So far, though there have been a few bad times, it's mostly pretty good. Last Aug I decided to look every day for something that brought me Joy. It didn't have to be anything big, just any little thing that helped me feel better-like clean,soft high thread count sheets. And despite what happened over the next 3 months(a bout of chf,broken femur,and a bowel obstruction-to say nothing of the usual family crap) I continued to do it. In many ways it turned my life around. The bout of congestive heart failure led to my being interviewed by kaiser palliative care team, which meant a visiting nurse,someone to call when things were not going well. And when I had the bowel obstruction and after some struggles led me to hospice care. So now I have Tina who comes 3 times a week to help however she can. Tina is fun-we almost always laugh, loves to do things with my hair and nails and she vacuums more often than I ever did when I was healthy. My nurse Darci has been showing up once a week since I started palliative care-she orders all my medications and sets them up for me-which is good because there are a lot of them, mostly for pain and they all seem to be the same color. She always checks me over and makes sure I'm ok. I also have a social worker who comes every week to help me check my thoughts and emotions.Meg throws in the little things like clipping the cats claws, or bringing me library books. When I need a Dr,Lisa comes to see me-and wants a hug as soon as she gets into the apt. I am surrounded by angels-not only through hospice, but with my family and friends too. Those of you who know me personally know that my young life was difficult and painful. My life now is the antithesis of my childhood and for the most part I feel more loved and cared for than I ever did before. I am not afraid of dying-it is, after all, a part of the life cycle-I've been the mother and the maiden. The time has come for me to be the crone-and you might see references to me as the toothless crone-the reasons for that are,unfortunately obvious. They cant fix my teeth without doing major surgery which I refuse to have-even if they would be willing to do the surgery because of my heart and lung problems. I do have lots of time to think and that is what this blog is about-my thoughts and feelings as I try to live the rest of my time being as open and joyful as I can