I have no desire to die, and I don’t expect to die in the near future. I will not grab the suffering of other people, and make it mine.
I understand the reasoning behind the warnings of Armageddon. They do need to get our attention.
But I’m still struggling to get comfortable with being one of the old at-risk people whose predicament may end up ruining the lives of countless innocent people and taking precedent over the young.
I don’t think that’s the way nature or God intended it.
I will always remember the old farmer who told me, “us old people die, it’s what we do. No running from it.”
There are people who accept that and people who don’t. I choose to accept it, much as I would hate to part with my wife and life and dogs and blog.
I might have found a solution for me.
I heard someone on CNN early this morning say with a straight face “if you are over 60, just stay inside, and don’t go out for any reason.” If there was ever a definition of panic in my mind, that was it.
I am quite prepared to stay from people, I am not prepared to disappear Sheltering In Place when I have a 17-acre woods 100 yards away.
So I got a bit pissed off and called my doctor and also my local hospital of choice.
I asked them if there was any way for me to ensure that if I got sick and needed a ventilator, and there were not enough to go around, could my ventilator, if I had one, go to a younger person, with more life ahead of them than I had?
My doctor’s office was surprised, but they said they would make a note of it in my file, and suggested if I was serious about it, would I write it down in a letter form and have it notarized or witnessed by two people?
I want to make sure that Maria is okay with this, but I am certain she will be.
The hospital said they had no program for that, it was the first they heard of it, but they suggested the very same thing – a notarized, witnessed document.
I do not expect this virus to come to my little town, but that means nothing.
Nor do I expect to get the virus. Of course, the virus doesn’t really care what I want. There are very few infected people anywhere near me.
I’m doing everything they tell me to do, but I am going outside every day to help feed the donkeys and sheep and walk Zinnia. And I will keep doing that.
And I will go every day to Jean’s to pick up some food. And I do what Maria tells me to do.I will wash my hands, etc… She said she wanted to talk about it, but if it really comes to that, she would do the same thing.
And we both intend to see it doesn’t come to that.
But I can’t abide by the idea that some 25 or 30-year-old or younger child could die without a ventilator while I get one at age 72. Not too many young people get very sick from the virus, but some do.
It doesn’t work for me to get preference over younger people, and I think I can pull this new plan off. Nobody said no.
I know other people my age feel the same way, but I don’t tell other people what to do or ask them to do what I do.
I never wanted to live to be 90 anyway.
This is no drama for me, so far this is other people’s pain and suffering, not mine.
I am not a Grief Thief. It’s a way of my feeling better about my odd role in this painful and unprecedented crisis in which I am asked to do nothing but hide in my house for a month or so.
I can do more than that.
I suspect at that stage the doctors will be in triage mode and would do that without benefit of your notarized statement, but it is generous of you to provide them with a written excuse for doing so!
Good for you Jon. I feel just the same. And don’t want to use a ventilator if it means a person in the prime of life would die. I also feel this whole virus circus is a world of so-called ‘experts’ chasing their tails in an effort to send the public generally into total panic. Ridiculous. And I’m not saying this blithely – I have pre-existing health issues that might make me especially at risk should I catch the Coronavirus. I love life passionately – and our amazing world and every single precious day – but when my time’s up, whenever that may be, I’m prepared to depart gracefully. I’d love to live until I’m 100, given I haven’t got some ghastly illness, but at 69 I’ve had a good innings. So to all the experts who are causing the global state of panic and shut down I send this plea: Let the younger people be saved if there has to be a choice of who to treat and stop destroying companies and livelihoods with this ridiculous advice that all young and middle-aged people should self-isolate. Then you, the Government, can spend the countless billions of pounds or dollars the companies and people will have to be given to keep them afloat on health care for those who do get very sick and research to find a vaccine. Doesn’t it make sense? I feel like a lone voice of reason singing in wind and no one hearing – so I’m just so glad to read your wise words. Jenny, the English painter living in Wales, UK. Love to you both and all your animals.
I have left exactly the same instructions for my children; I am glad you and I are of the same mind on this topic. Well said, Jon
If you Google advanced care directive in New York State you can print off the forms you need to state your end of life preferences. Then your healthcare providers will have this in your file.
5.7 magnitude earthquake in Utah, worldwide pestilence… what’s next – a plague of locusts? This whole thing is starting to have a biblical feel to it. Is God or Mother Nature trying to tell us something? On the bright side, the price of gas at the pumps keeps going down … problem is, we’re supposed to stay home and not much is open anyway. Thankfully, we can still chat on the phone, FaceTime, text etc. Yes, we have to practice social distancing but that doesn’t mean we have to be socially isolated. Can’t wait to see what tomorrow brings. Jon, maybe that elderly woman you swiped the toilet paper from in the store would be willing to give up her ventilator to someone younger … like you! (We do have to keep a sense of humor – I’m just whistling past the graveyard)
In Italy, where the population is a high percentage of older people, they triaged like in wartime. They treated those first who were most likely to survive, they spent no resources on games they couldn’t easily win. So the question of who gets the last ventilator became a clinical decision. The natural order of things. Can in these times be bought and sold to be sure, but the survival of the fittest is still a thing. I love you guys. So I can’t help but wonder if this particular concern is worth any energy. Still Jon, you are my hero for thinking of it.