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Apr. 14th, 2008 12:54 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ljgeoffFirst, a plug for a new documentary: A Sea Change
Question: Are we screwed?
Answer: Are we screwed? Yes, to a considerable extent.
Ok, this post might be a bit of a downer for some folks, so if you have a problem with a middle-aged woman talking about being old in a world going to hell in a hand-basket, and the ethics of suicide, you might want to scroll by this one.
I have no idea at all of what old age has in store for me. My maternal grandmother died at 56 from breast cancer and my paternal grandmother died at the age of 98, completely senile. My mother died at the age of 26 from birth complications and my dad had quintuple bypass surgery two years ago -- he's doing great, on meds for high BP and cholesterol.
But at my physical three years ago, my doc said that I was as healthy as the proverbial horse, blood pressure and sugar and lipids all in the normal range for a woman 10 years younger.
I've spent most of my adult life caring for elderly clients, so I have a really good idea of what its gonna be like when I'm in my 70's, 80's and 90's. I can easily see myself as being vital and of use to my community at 75, and if I am good at taking care of myself, at 85, but after that, it gets rather sketchy.
What got this interior conversation going was a bit of thought from Lovelock, something to the effect that when the shit hits the fan, communities might have to make some difficult choices in the alocation of resourses and the elderly.
I was talking candidly to the wife of a client, a woman who had nursed both her mother and sister through early-onset Alzheimer's. "My biggest fear," she said, "is that I'll get it and wait too long, and then be too far gone to do the right thing." -- that being suicide, which we both agreed, without hesitation or melodrama, to be the choice to make when faced with the identity-destroying prognosis of Alzheimer's.
I have no problem with someone who has had a long life and who has decided that they are done now, to choosing suicide. What I have a problem with is when choice becomes expectation, becomes custom, becomes enforced custom. Lovelock is expecting an 80% decrease in human population over the next four generations. Even if it is only a fraction of his prediction, there will be a breakdown in custom and culture, and different small communities will make different choices.
hmm, hmmm, hmmm ....
Couldn't make myself go to Electricity or Blacksmithing today. Well, I guess I can get over to blacksmithing... Gotta do better, damnit. Sometimes it's hard to see why it matters.
Question: Are we screwed?
Answer: Are we screwed? Yes, to a considerable extent.
Ok, this post might be a bit of a downer for some folks, so if you have a problem with a middle-aged woman talking about being old in a world going to hell in a hand-basket, and the ethics of suicide, you might want to scroll by this one.
I have no idea at all of what old age has in store for me. My maternal grandmother died at 56 from breast cancer and my paternal grandmother died at the age of 98, completely senile. My mother died at the age of 26 from birth complications and my dad had quintuple bypass surgery two years ago -- he's doing great, on meds for high BP and cholesterol.
But at my physical three years ago, my doc said that I was as healthy as the proverbial horse, blood pressure and sugar and lipids all in the normal range for a woman 10 years younger.
I've spent most of my adult life caring for elderly clients, so I have a really good idea of what its gonna be like when I'm in my 70's, 80's and 90's. I can easily see myself as being vital and of use to my community at 75, and if I am good at taking care of myself, at 85, but after that, it gets rather sketchy.
What got this interior conversation going was a bit of thought from Lovelock, something to the effect that when the shit hits the fan, communities might have to make some difficult choices in the alocation of resourses and the elderly.
I was talking candidly to the wife of a client, a woman who had nursed both her mother and sister through early-onset Alzheimer's. "My biggest fear," she said, "is that I'll get it and wait too long, and then be too far gone to do the right thing." -- that being suicide, which we both agreed, without hesitation or melodrama, to be the choice to make when faced with the identity-destroying prognosis of Alzheimer's.
I have no problem with someone who has had a long life and who has decided that they are done now, to choosing suicide. What I have a problem with is when choice becomes expectation, becomes custom, becomes enforced custom. Lovelock is expecting an 80% decrease in human population over the next four generations. Even if it is only a fraction of his prediction, there will be a breakdown in custom and culture, and different small communities will make different choices.
hmm, hmmm, hmmm ....
Couldn't make myself go to Electricity or Blacksmithing today. Well, I guess I can get over to blacksmithing... Gotta do better, damnit. Sometimes it's hard to see why it matters.