I very much dislike talking about my health to people other than my wife, and I hate being vulnerable in front of her. I’m old enough, and don’t wish to appear any older.

But every few months, I am drawn to writing about my health, it seems as I begin to get old that I am learning important new things about my body and the very idea of health and also about the way mind works or doesn’t. I am also learning again and again that help helps, something that is often hard for men to grasp.

As someone with two increasingly common chronic diseases, I am also learning things that about my health that might be useful to others.

Beyond that, I have promised to be open on the blog, and that is a promise I have kept, it has seemed to work and so I will  continue the practice. It feels good to me to be open, it feels  honest and light, I have no secrets and nothing much to fear or hide from the truth. That is one of the best things about getting older. When I was young, I had 1,000 secrets to keep.

What I dislike about talking about my health is the way in which it can come to define the lives of older people, and the people around them. Ever since I  had open heart surgery, people have often treated me differently,  as if I am stricken with the plague, they often look at me with sadness or concern, as if I am object of pity, and will ask, sometimes clasping my hand, “how is your health?”

I have friends who I rarely have from, but come running if they think I am sick or hear I am sick. They want to hear all about it, and share some advice from their own experiences. That is the currency of being older in America, how can we all survive our own ideas of aging and health?

The people clasping my hand in sympathy would be shocked, and rightfully so, if they knew I wanted to slug them, but I haven’t and won’t do that.  Even though it is none of their business. Even though my health does not define who I am.

They are just expressing concern in the way they have learned to  express it, in the way they have  seen.  It is still okay to stereotype the aging and demean and trivialize their lives. We do not have a me.too movement for bigotry.

The foundation of old talk is health, from the cost of drugs to the foibles of doctors to the ills and pains of the body. Most of the older people I do know and talk with try to avoid many of the older people they know. They don’t want to talk about their health.  When I hear somebody start talking about the old days or young people today, I know it’s time to run.

I believe old talk is a lethal killer, it brings more people to ruin than any chronic disease. I’d rather talk about sex and change and the new things I am learning in life.

The last  thing I want is people telling me they are sorry for me on Facebook or praying for my recovery, or wishing me recovery. There is no recovery from the aging process, and I am happy being older. I’m good at it.

I am not sick or dying, and do not need pity, I’m just getting older, as every one of us is,  and learning how to do it.  And I realize that no one taught me anything about it, I have to teach myself.

And I have a lot to learn when it comes to taking good care of me.

The last months have been especially tiring for me, and  for the best possible reasons.

Many trips to Albany, visits to the Mansion, the drain of the resident’s illnesses, the tragedy, violence and struggle of the refugees. The strain of fund-raising almost every day, the negotiations with landlords, welfare officials,  amusement parts , aquariums, sports apparel companies and soccer field owners, bureaucratic do-gooders, rule-bound welfare agencies, writing, blogging, taking photos, loving my wife,  walking my dogs, caring for the farm, struggling with the news.

At night, I am often haunted by the images of Mansion residents who need shoes or clothes, of the refugees who need homes and help. They dance around in my dreams, calling out for help. They get under my skin, as they should.

And yes, I am also often worrying about the things everyone worries about, the bills, hay and wood orders, holes in the roof, dust on the lawn mowers, broken blinds on the porch, food for the dogs, tune-up and rotating tires for the car, the never ending stream of bills to pay, the rising cost of everything.

It’s an odd thing about getting older, it is hard to believe that I have less energy than I used to have, that I tire more easily, and need a bit more rest. I am bad at rest, my mind races through the night, it hates to rest.

I have been busy and distracted, so much so I haven’t noticed things that were happening to my body.

In recent months, I’ve had two medical situations to confront, both were disturbing and challenging, both reminded me of the importance of paying attention to myself, of having doctors (preferably nurses) I can talk openly with and listen to.

The first problem was glossing over a problem with my eyesight.

The tops of letters were disappearing on the pages of books and on my computer screen. It was as if almost all letters viewed at a certain angle lost about a third of their tops. It took me two months to finally make an appointment, and I was quickly rushed to a retinal specialist who showed me quite eerie photographs of serious swelling that threatened my left eye, and to a lesser sense, my right.  It could quite easily, I was told, cause blindness if not treated.

I was shocked of course, I attributed the problem to allergies, or aging or  computer  fatigue or any other dumb thing I could think of. This reminds me of the time I assured my wonderful nurse-practioner Karen Bruce that I had asthma even as I was in the middle of a heart attack. I never heard the end of that, but it didn’t keep me from doing the same dumb thing at least two times more, one regarding my eye, the other my diabetes.

One thing about me: I am slow to awaken to health problems, but a tiger once I get on it. Focus is my strength and salvation, even though I can be oblivious and  dense.

Over the past three months, I’ve  taken powerful and expensive eye drops four times a  day, and had two substantial laser eye surgeries, and a half-dozen visits to retinal specialists. My eye sight is now 20/20  again with glasses and I am no longer threatened with blindness, at least for now, and probably for good.

I will need more surgeries and more drops and more exams. I can’t just forget it again.

Once we got onto it, I found it treatable if I worked at it. The letters I see are clear and complete, the swelling has been pushed way back from the retina. I don’t need to so a doctor again for three months. I might need some surgery forever. I have no strain when I write, which is often.

The second problem:

In the intensity of the last few months, I stopped taking my blood sugar numbers regularly, sometimes not even for weeks. I have controlled my diabetes well and completely for some years now, I just took it for granted I was okay. I started paying less attention to diet and didn’t think about carbohydrates. Nor did I pay attention to diabetes and aging, it can roar up and bite. I just didn’t want to think about it all the time.

I didn’t want to notice that my body was bloating up, I was gaining weight even though I am quite active and eat well. Diabetes is not quite like that, of course, you always have to pay attention to it, and you can lose control quite easily, even if you eat well and are  active. As you get older, the treatment and control changes, and you have to change with it.

Some of you may have noticed my face bloating up in photographs. I didn’t, not until lately.

I had a regular check-up with Karen and when I saw her, she asked me how I was. I was fine, I said.

No,  you are not, she said. You are in trouble. My AiC number, the best indicator of diabetic health, has shot up two points.

In the days before the exam, I suspected trouble. I started checking my numbers again and was alarmed. My blood sugar was up by 30 or 40 per cent, even after fasting. Some of my post-meal numbers dinner were even higher than that. And I couldn’t bring them down. I was sure they would come down, they always had. They didn’t.

Worse, Karen was leaving the health center and moving to the Adirondacks. She was worried about me, she said and made me promise to contact my diabetes specialist in Bennington, Vt. To make sure, she called them about my blood work, a final act of love and concern.  And told them to hunt me down if I didn’t show up. I did, she is good at frightening me.

And I saw that she was concerned. I was concerned. I didn’t tell her I had been feeling increasingly drowsy in the morning, and early afternoon, two time periods when I have plenty of energy.

This was a bad path for me, these numbers unchecked lead to strokes, heart attacks and many other things I don’t wish to have. Diabetes is one of the best chronic diseases to have, because it can be controlled to a great extent if you really bother to control it. It will wreak havoc with your body if you don’t. For years, Karen has been telling me I was the best diabetic patient she had ever had in her practice, the most diligent and disciplined. She didn’t say that this time, I didn’t even get a sticker.

I made an appointment and went to see Sheila, my diabetic nurse practitioner, another woman I could talk to who cared about. She didn’t waste any time. She said she was certain my body was processing sugar differently as I got older, and I probably did need to pay much more attention to carbohydrates I was consuming, lots of things that say healthy on the package are not healthy if you look at the ingredients.

She put me on a new medication that helped the body eliminate excess sugar and bring my numbers back under control. She said it was a powerful new medication and warned of severe side effects for at least a few days.

I started checking my blood regularly, I re-cast my diet and paid close attention to carbohydrates. I stopped consuming them.

The new medication was potent, and there were a lot of side effects – nausea, dizziness, irritability, lightness in the head. It got better after a few days, but it was hard to adjust to it.

I may be on it the rest of my life, but my body is getting used to it. Among other things, it  triggered startly frequent  urination – this is how the diabetic body gets rid of excess sugar. I was stunned by what came out of me, what had been building in my blood and body. I lost 11 pounds in just a few days. That is serious.

Yesterday, and today, my numbers returned to normal.

My drowsiness has disappeared. I am eating the right food at the right time, and paying close attention to my numbers. I feel dramatically better, and back in control. I feel strong and ready for the good and hard work I have to do and love to do. Bring it on. I have my energy back, I told Maria. Dear God, she said.

Anybody who tries old talk or health chatter with me will regret it, and when they come up to me with sad eyes and ask softly, “how’s your health?,” I will look at them cross-eyed and say with a smile, “great, how’s yours?”

What’s the lesson for me? Hubris can kill. I must always find a good health care person and listen to them, hopefully a her. I will make no assumptions about chronic diseases, they will sneak up and bite me in the ass.

This is a story with a happy ending for me, there is no need for worry. And I have no speeches to give to others.

Health is a personal thing, we are all different, we all want different things.  We all have the right to make our own decisionsI talked to a man in the  waiting room who said his diabetes was killing him, but you know what?, he  said, I’m happy to die rather than give up the lifestyle I want.

Not me, brother, I said, I am happier than I have ever  been, and busier doing things I value, and living with a wonderful woman. I have much to live for and am just beginning to get on with it.

As I got up to see Karen, we shook hands and hugged and wished the other well.  I couldn’t see her, but I got a bit teary. She will be very hard to replace.

But I didn’t want to be  him, and he didn’t want to be me. Fair enough. I’ll keep a better eye on myself, and get back to life.