So no financial woes. Instead, my woes are my health and loneliness. Constantly deteriorating health is expected at our age of course. So I always pray that I can go on to the next life before I get too debilitated and helpless. My greatest fear is Alzheimer's disease. Because the only other survivor in my immediate family is my 95-year old Mother who has that Alzheimer's whom I had to finally commit to a nursing home. What makes it so difficult for me emotionally is that her dementia has made her forget who I am. Before her dementia, she and I were very close and we used to go on many excursions together. What's so difficult is when she stares blankly at me and does not say hello and does not even say a single word, then it's as though her soul is already gone. Her physical body is alive but her soul is gone. So much as I hate to say it I have cut down on my visits to her because it's much too painful to visit her and get no response at all. I hope you folks can understand me. I'm sorry.
I am 51, but I have older brothers and sisters who are in their 60's. We just lost our 83 year-old Mom, and she had both diabetes and related health conditions, and dementia. So I can empathize with you, it's extremely hard in every single aspect to see your loved one deteriorate right in front of your eyes. I was her caregiver, and we were having to deal with problems coming from members in our dysfunctional family. I think people sense when a loved one is nearing death and they act out in bizarre, but in hindsight, not surprising, ways.
I started grieving a long time ago. I realized this after her death, because I tend to blame myself for things and I spend a lot of time in reflection about the past and what I could have done differently. My mom, and others who have this horrible disease, are not the people they used to be. They lose their personality, their interests, their meaning in life. It's tragic. You want so much for them to be the same person that they've been all of your life, but instead you have to watch them slip away, and there's nothing you can do to save them.
I've been doing research, because I am terrified of becoming like my mom and dad (Dad is still alive, but he's 2 years older than my mom and has a lot of health problems and like all of us now in deep grief). It's a process that usually starts 20 to 30 years earlier, because of the processed food we all eat, stress, and a sedentary lifestyle. It begins with the food though, because the food is poisoned (all forms of sugar are poison, and the cheap oils they put in everything are rancid). The food we eat makes us feel horrible: brain fog, hard to get motivated, depressed, hopeless, apathetic.
I have been looking at the pictures of my mom through the years, how even in her 40's, she was beautiful and slim. Then my dad divorced her in 1982, and she went to school to become a nurse. There were still three of us kids at home, and she had to support us and herself. She was an amazing woman. It's just now sinking in how much she did for us and the sacrifices she made. I miss her so much!!!
So, we moved to Florida after she graduated, and then to make more money, she worked the night shift for years and years, and because of that unnatural way of living, she gained weight and it was always a struggle for her, because not only did she not have time to make home-made food, she was eating the processed food (no one knew how bad it was for us until only recently). She wasn't getting proper rest... I remember her being grouchy in those first few years of her working full time as an RN nurse, and how I felt like I couldn't go to her for my problems. I was still in high school at the time. And she wanted my oldest brother to come with his family, and go to school here and she would help them, and she thought my brother could get a part-time job while going to school and his wife could part-time.
She rented an apartment, but they had no intentions of doing that -- they wanted a free ride while my brother went to school and waited a full month to move here. Mom was so upset! I remember. They lived with us, and it was hellish, because they were the type of parents that ignored their kids and their kids ran around with sippy cups and spilled juice and koolaid all over the floors and furniture (that was new, because Mom bought new furniture for our house and it was something she was proud of, because it was a symbol of her being able to take care of us, as my dad refused to pay child support all those years and we lived below the poverty level when she was going to school). It just makes me sick inside to think back on it.
Anyway, if you remember and watch any TV show or movie from the 70's -- look at how thin and healthy everyone was! It's not normal to be overweight. And yet, almost everyone today has a few extra pounds all the way to being obese. I'm not trying to pick on anyone but the truth is, we've been poisoned by the food we eat every day.
The Keto diet and the Carnivore diet are the answers to this problem... if you start researching, there is a huge movement of doctors and health professionals who are talking about this and how to go about reclaiming your life, if you want to. I listen to Dr. Eric Berg, Dr. Mark Hyman, Dr. Jason Fung, and several other doctors, all on YouTube. Also, Low Carb Down Under has guest doctors give informative lectures, from which I've learned a lot and I take notes. I also like this one guy who used to weigh over 300 pounds when he was a young guy (due to mold poisoning that led to a lot of terrible symptoms), and he was able to overcome it finally, now has a multi-million dollar company (Bulletproof), focusing on longevity, and has written several books. His name is Dave Asprey and he also has interviews on YouTube.
I also watch and read specialist doctors on Alzheimer's and they say it's not a normal part of aging, AT ALL. Dr. Dale Bredesen, (The Root Cause of Alzheimer's and How to Reverse It); Dr. Paul Mason (Reversing Dementia With Diet).
