Category Archives: Death

Death

Seeking a Friend for the End of the World

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Today I caught most of the Keira Knightly , Steve Carrell end of days dramady as the token distraction entertainment on a short flight. While the movie itself isn’t Oscar-worthy or even new in its themes, the concept of “what would you do – and what would you regret – if the world had three weeks left of existence” is one that we all should try to answers throughout our lives when there is no likely cause of pending extinction.

The film (which I haven’t seen the ending to) poses a variety of potential scenarios for the end of days, with some rioting, others committing suicide by jumping off buildings or hiring an assassin to get them when they least expect it, and many more leaving the person they were with for many years just because or trying to find a lost love all while connecting with the people in our lives that way may see on a regular basis that otherwise you’d never even say hi to.

It happens that on this flight I was en route to visit my 80-something year old grandmother who has squandered away her life savings due to gambling addiction and pushed away her family due to her judgmental, self-righteous personality. I’ve visited her before, when she lived in a retirement community, where she didn’t seem to have many friends, but at least had the freedom to leave the community to play her piano gigs around the city and go to the casino. I haven’t yet seen her in her new “home,” the small assisted living establishment, which will undoubtedly be a depressing sight. She’s fortunate her social security covers this housing arrangement, as the next best options are certainly a steep drop off of whatever life quality she’s experiencing today. I’m told she also has dementia, slipping in and out of today and many years ago, not sure if she’s 60 or 80, alone or with others, dying tomorrow or still young and with many good years ahead of her.

The other day, I read an article that quoted a survey on when people think one becomes an “adult.” The average answer was 28. In less than a month now I’ll be 29. And I’m definitely feeling the transition between my youth and adulthood. It’s crazy to think that if I make it to 100 I’ve lived more than a quarter of my life, but less than half. Of course, the world could end tomorrow, or my world could, and it may be I’ve lived 99% of it. But even with 72 years left, perhaps 50 of them being in decent health and with the majority of my friends and loved ones still alive, I wonder how different reality is from any given doomsday scenario.

An article came out a while back about how Facebook’s COO Sheryl Sandberg finally got the courage to announce that she leaves work at 5pm everyday to spend time with family. That led to a bunch of comments about how she can leave at 5pm because the many people who work under her stay late to finish the projects that she likely assigns. The article notes that while people in their 20s may enjoy the idea of working 24 hours a day, seven days a week, you get to a point in your life where this “work-life” balance thing becomes important. Yea, it’s about the time you become an “adult.” 28-30 or so. This is also the time you’re less likely to take risks, less likely to start your first company, less likely to appreciate change.

I’m torn between a thirst for adventure and uncertainty and the status quo. Massive anxiety fills my veins as I face what looks to be a decade coming of marriage, children, motherhood, the true end to whatever youth there is left inside of me. And yet I’ve never been good at “youth” to begin with. With the exception of a few nights of foggy recollection, my life has been relatively tame. I never did move to the big city like I thought I would (which seemed to be the only respectable thing to do after growing up in the suburbs with a stay-at-home mom who went nowhere and a father who commuted an hour into the city each day for work.) Instead, I moved from a city I couldn’t appreciate as a busy, under 21 (and depressed) college student to the suburbs where I’ve been ever since. Granted, these burbs or Silicon Valley are more or less a city in their own right, and job opportunity here for people my age is probably as good or better than the rest of the country, including those big cities.

But as I approach my 30s, I wonder if I’ll have regrets later in life for not putting myself out there more. The number of serious relationships I’ve had I can count on one hand. I could have gone to grad school, but didn’t. I’m somehow writing my story one sentence at a time, and miraculously the pages are still turning and the ink hasn’t dried up. It seems as though death is no longer something that happens at the end of one’s life, but instead of a multi-stage process, a life of death and rebirth, everyday, every moment as you grow older you change, and suddenly you’ll catch a glimpse of yourself in the mirror or the hint of a reflection in a store window when you least expect it, and you won’t recognize who you see. Something in your eyes will confirm that the person you’re looking at is indeed the same person peering out of your mind, but the rest will seem like a mirage, until you accept it.

Everyone goes through the process of aging, but I’m not sure I’m strong enough to face it head on without some serious distraction. Isn’t that what life is – just a distraction to help us get from birth to death and produce offspring? Everything – from our jobs to our religion to our sports teams are distractions from the greatest horror story of all, our own existence. Eating is wonderful and shelter is ideal, but everything else is icing on the cake of distraction to prevent us from accepting that we are in the midst of an extremely drawn-out doomsday scenario. Yes, we will die. And yes, one day the entire world as we know it will come to an end. Lights out. And perhaps life will show up again in some other form or the same form, who knows. But all of the political fights – on either side of the equation – are just yet another distraction to keep us from focusing on our meaningless existence. If we were to accept that doomsday scenario, how many more people would riot? How many more would jump from the top of buildings? How many would continue to seek true love versus the love they’ve been handed? And then — this makes me appreciate parts of my life much more, especially when I can honestly say that even if the world were ending — tomorrow — or 100 years from now — I’ve found the perfect man for me, and there are plenty of good things in my life. But still, I can’t help but focus on what I might regret, and that distracts me from any chance of contentment.

Death, Family, Health

Facing Reality of Cancer as Autumn Leaves Burn to Umber

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As I’ve written about previously, my father has cancer. He was diagnosed three years ago with advanced stage prostate cancer. If you’ve been reading my blog, you know I have an interesting relationship with my dad. I wouldn’t say we’re the closet father-daughter pairing in the world, but regardless he’s still my father and I’ve always imagined watching him grow old and having him around as the grandfather to my future children — he was always good with really little kids. I wanted him to meet my kids, and for them to have him as a grandfather. I’ve always known he’d be a much better grandfather then father.

But everyday that goes by, I know this is more and more unlikely of how life will pan out. With cancer, you can be fine one day and the next your conditions can deteriorate rapidly. Living far away, I try to visit often, but in between there is little conversation. He doesn’t like talking about his emotions or what he is going through, though lately he’s admit to being depressed. He won’t admit to being depressed about dying, per say, more so that the drugs they have given him have removed his testosterone and have “feminized” him. Really, though, I know he’s equally, if not more depressed because he’s terminally ill. But I don’t know how to deal with that. He doesn’t want to talk about it. I want to be a support for him, but I don’t know if I can handle it, even if he was willing to talk.

The day today on the east coast is cool and crisp, with a heavy grey sky, and bright yellow leaves on the trees falling off in the wind to dry and die on the ground. Another year has come and gone — and things are slowly changing. Everything is aging, myself included. I don’t like change, but I’m not resistant to it. I’m more in denial about it. That will all change the day my father’s condition gets worse — which is any day now. That will all change when I need to decide how important it is for me to be out here with him through his final days, however long they may be, or to maintain my life across the country, far from his inevitable deathbed. I don’t like to think about it, but it’s getting to a point where I’m going to have to. I don’t know if he would want me here, he hates being seen as weak. But I’d want to be here. It’s strange knowing that in the next year or two, this is something I will have to face. It’s part of life, but he’s still young at 60, and I’m not ready for him to go. I keep hoping that someone will discover a cure for prostate cancer, and everyday there’s a new treatment available, but never a cure.

Career, Death, Mental Illness, Wealth

Girls Just Want to Have Fun

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When I was filling out the “10 financial commandments for your 20s” post, one of the commandments said that you should be focusing on having fun in your 20s. That one bullet sent me into a bit of an identity crisis. I started to try to remember what I consider fun… and it was really difficult to find something. I’m struggling to find anything outside of my job that is fun in my life.

I’m turning 28 next month, and while the birthdays before this one haven’t felt significant, I am starting to feel, well, old. Now, I know some of you who read my blog are much older than I am, and I don’t mean that you’re extra old. I’m just saying that — as the world around me ages — I question not just what I’m living for, but also what I’m not living for. One thing I’ve realized lately is that I’ve died a few times so far in my life. For instance, the young me that I once was died a long time ago. She doesn’t exist any more. She might not be buried under ground, but she’s just as dead as a corpse. And although I never loved her, I still miss her and need to take the time to morn her passing. I also need to remember what made her happy, and try to bring some of that back into my life. Continue reading Girls Just Want to Have Fun →

Death, Family, Infertility

When Parents are Dying: Coping & Planning

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Death is never a pleasant experience. As I watch my father slip slowly away, I try to come to terms with reality, but since no one in my family has ever learned how to cope with the cruel nature of life, so goes our lack of outward empathy in death. I’ve never had anyone close to me die, and all that’s going to change — whether in a year or five years, I don’t know, but my father’s cancer is back with a vengeance, and regardless of how much I avoid acknowledging reality, the day will come when I won’t see him alive again.

In the meantime, there are arrangements to be made. Uncomfortable arrangements. Who wants to discuss plans for after they part with the world? My mother and I had a brief conversation today about what her plans are in retirement — selfish as she is, with everything always about her, her sadness only formed in confusion over next steps in her life without the normal next steps for a husband and wife approaching retirement.

The question of what happens to her after he’s gone is one I’ve avoided getting deeply involved in. I told her that I don’t want to be the person to help her decide what to do with her finances because I would not feel comfortable telling her to spend or save money that may have some effect on a one-day inheritance for myself or my sister. I’d rather she discuss this with my father, and make her own decisions, or at least with the help of a trustworthy financial adviser.

Meanwhile, at lunch today, she managed to make me feel terrible, though not on purpose, about previously asking whether she’d be willing to contribute some future financial support for the various fertility treatments I’ll likely have to go through one day in order to have children. As my mother has made numerous comments about wanting grandchildren, I don’t expect her to help me financially with treatments, but if she could help when the time comes, it would be appreciated. But today, in front of company, she made some comment about how I said that she “has to help me” with affording having children, which was a very uncomfortable moment, that took its time to set in before later making me extremely upset. She claims she didn’t mean it that way at all, but it was her friend that responded that she really didn’t seem like she wanted to help me in this situation.

But anyway, I digress. The point here is that these things that will come up in the future are my own costs; but it is up to my mother if she wants to help out ever. I don’t want to be the person to ask her or tell her what to do. I apparently shouldn’t even mention these things, as just vaguely mentioning that I’d appreciate her help if it turns out I’ll need costly fertility treatments turns into a huge deal where she clearly doesn’t want to help, she just feels like she has to. I don’t want her help unless she wants to give it. And she never will.

And, at the same time, I deep down do want to “help” my father at this point — even though he’s often cruel to me — and I can’t. It’s always walking on eggshells around him. His reactions are never something you can guess, and with his illness he’s become, justifiably, even more moody. But I question my own motives for wanting to help — perhaps my motives are inherently flawed and narcissistic, after all I’m still just a little girl seeking her father’s approval. Wanting him to feel comfortable confiding in her about his feelings, without actually being emotionally prepared or strong enough to survive what that actually means. For better or worse, he doesn’t want to talk about it. He wants to mope and be depressed on his own, then get angry over little things that don’t matter, to criticize his family, to avoid his own complete lack of control, his life slowly slipping from his hands as his health manages to fail for all his many medical problems unrelated to the cancer, leaving his last years of life filled with discomfort up to pain. I’m a sick person for at some level wanting him to suffer — but not to die, not to suffer and then learn a lesson in taking your depression and issues out on everyone else — and then to go on with life a new person, a nicer person, one who has learned how to care about other people in a way that doesn’t involve control and manipulation. That’s a story that will never play out. The reality is his suffering only going to get worse. I may be here to see it, I may be home on the other coast, hearing detailed stories from a woman who will complain about having to waste her days helping him, feeling guilty for not being here, feeling guilty for not feeling guilty for not being here, and so on.

The practical questions of what will happen to my mother after my father passes away are ones I haven’t been able to ask, for I can’t bring myself to talking to my father about death. I’m even angry at him because had he gone to the doctor regularly they could have probably caught his cancer early, and with prostate cancer it’s usually curable if caught early. But he didn’t want to go to the doctor because of his weight, which also likely increased his risk of getting the cancer.

Here I am at 27, having finally almost come to accept my own future death, but I am not prepared to watch either of my parents go. Not even my father, who was destined to die early with his morbid obesity, diabetes, and other health issues, even before the cancer.

Life is so short, and it’s passing by so quickly. I was miserable throughout my childhood, yet I’m nostalgic for the few moments of happiness, or even boredom, wasting away lazy summer days, with all the time in the world, all the life in the world. And now, it slips, with ends looming behind every corner.

 

 

 

Death, Family, Shopping

A Post About Life, Death, and “Stuff”

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My father worked his entire life taking a train into the city and home, five days a week, with an hour-and-some-odd-long commute and long hours. He earned good money, enough to support an upper middle class life for myself, my sister, and my stay-at-home mom.

He retired early because he was overweight and couldn’t take the commute anymore. A few years later, he was diagnosed with terminal cancer. The recession hit and his 401k, once nearing $2 Million, was down to below $1M — still a respectable amount for retirement, but not necessarily enough to support his lifestyle, illness treatment, and my mom’s high-maintenance lifestyle.

Three years ago, my father was told he has two years to live. I’m glad he’s outlived that doctor prediction, but the reality is that it’s unlikely he’s going to live for many more years. He doesn’t want to think about that, or believe that, understandably, so while he complains about his slowly depleting bank account, he’s been spending the last year obsessively purchasing stuff to put in our NJ home. It’s actually really sad, as he’s spending lots of money to fast redecorate the entire home, and completely refurnish rooms, because to him, stuff is important, or at the very least a distraction from reality.

He purchased a $3,000 rug for the dining room, he’s bought paintings for thousands of dollars that have questionable value, but he liked them. He wants the house to look like a museum, now that he has time to shop for art. He complains that building on to the family room cost too much money, yet continues to spend. It’s not my place to say anything about his purchases, but the other reality is I’m going to be the one left to deal with my mother when she runs out of money later in life. And I’ll deal with it when the time comes, but all I want to do is teach my parents how to be responsible with money. It’s not a conversation I can have with my father — he’s worked his whole life while barely living and if acquiring “art,” movies and books makes him happy, then he should be able to do this… even if it means my mother is going to have to learn how to live on less or, more likely, run out of money when she’s 80.

I really hope I can live a life where I never get to the end and feel like I need to rush to spend my money buying stuff to fill the emptiness that extends beyond a few white walls. For now, I’ll continue to be surprised by the latest addition to my family “museum” every trip I take home.