Drinking Through a Straw -The Luckiest Man

I suppose it was inevitable that everything happening to me would catch up and I would have a few days of being discouraged.

This was go to doctors’ week.  I had good visits with my Neurologist and Pulmonologist, and a full set of pulmonology function tests that are about as close to waterboarding as I ever want to get.

Bottom line is not real news, but does put a seal on my own self-awareness.  I am getting weaker.  I am now walking with a cane full time (or at least when out of the house). Eating anything harder than pudding is a thing of the past. Breathing while lying on my back is getting weaker, so I will begin the process of moving to new breathing assistance in the next week.  It is a little harder for people to understand my speech, so I am concentrating on slowing down and speaking clearly.  And I am using my iPad technology to help in some settings. Finally, the H word has now been said out loud – Hospice.  We will start meeting with them after the summer to better understand the support and services I will eventually require.

So my initial reaction to the two days of medical visits was to be discouraged.

But thankfully the sour mood did not last long. I was told I do not have to worry any longer about cholesterol or blood sugar numbers.  I participated in a series of very important planning meetings for the non-profit organization whose Board I now chair.  Check out www.Restoninterfaith.org and standby as we unveil our new and powerful name in the next month. I had wonderful reaffirming opportunities to talk with family and friends. I had good workouts at the gym.  Roz and I saw a fabulous production of Anything Goes at the Kennedy Center.  I made and shared wonderful smoothies and gazpacho. And we get to spend the evening of the 4th on a small boat with good friends watching and launching fireworks.  We arranged to meet old friends on our upcoming trip to Europe.

I wrote to a friend today that I understood the risk she was taking by putting so many of her emotional eggs in my nest, and told her I will do my best to not drop them. Her loving response reassured me that I can trust and rely on my friends and family to make this journey with me, and that we are all stronger when we are united.

On this day in 1939 Lou Gehrig spoke these memorable words: “Today I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of the Earth.”  That is exactly how I feel today, and so much of the credit goes to all of you who are standing by to pick me up when I fall, to ignore my drooling, to concentrate hard to understand me, and see the real me behind this masquerade of my illness.  Thank you!!!