{"id":5777,"date":"2022-08-07T07:56:51","date_gmt":"2022-08-07T11:56:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dahlman.online\/?p=5777"},"modified":"2023-06-11T11:47:21","modified_gmt":"2023-06-11T15:47:21","slug":"old-man-experience","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dahlman.online\/index.php\/2022\/08\/07\/old-man-experience\/","title":{"rendered":"Old Man Experience"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

This is another in the Sunday Story Series.  No politics here, just a story from someone beginning life with a Medicare card in his wallet.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

 Red-White and Blue Club<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

I turned sixty-five last September.  This morning I realized that in five weeks, I\u2019ll be sixty-six \u2013 so much older it seems, than just \u201cMedicare age\u201d.  And I\u2019ve spent the last couple of months doing \u201cMedicare\u201d kind of things, using my Red-White and Blue Medicare ID card.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

When you first reach \u201cthis age\u201d, you get a free medical appointment.  In fact, you are required to participate in the \u201cfree\u201d appointment as a condition of getting Medicare.  Since I had my last physical just a couple weeks before my last birthday, I put off getting my \u201cfree\u201d one until the summer (or until my physician started warning me about the \u201cdire\u201d consequences of skipping the \u201cintroductory\u201d exam).  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Look, I\u2019ve had enough health conditions that I\u2019m a pretty steady, once a year physical kind of guy.   Getting an annual was long on my calendar before I reached Medicare age.  So I scheduled for early in the morning, as usual.  That way when they wanted to do blood tests, fasting wasn\u2019t an issue. I usually don\u2019t eat much in the AM anyway.  As long as they don\u2019t worry about super-high-insanely-tenacious<\/em> black coffee, I\u2019m a pretty happy guy.  Without the coffee, I\u2019m a danger on the road, and asleep in the waiting room.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

State of Head<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

But what I wasn\u2019t prepared for was \u201cthe quiz\u201d.  You see, when you enter Medicare, the physician is required to evaluate your mental state.   They\u2019re searching for signs of dementia, or Alzheimer\u2019s (even if it takes the spell checker to get that right).  So you have to take the test.  First, there are three words \u2013 random words like:  banana, sunrise, chair.  The lady testing  just says them, then moves onto other questions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAm I dizzy often, do I fall a lot, do I feel safe at home, do I forget where I\u2019m going?\u201d.  Next, it\u2019s the draw the clock test \u2013 where do the hands go if it\u2019s 11:10.  Of course, I try to side-track the test (just like every student I ever taught); \u201cwhat happens when the generation arrives that doesn\u2019t do analog time?\u201d  The tester stumbles for a second, then comes back with, \u201cWell anyone your age should be able to, so draw the clock\u201d.  I carefully suppress the urge to write 11:10, and  put the short hand where 11 goes, and the long hand at 2.  I hope she can tell the difference.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Big Question<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

So it\u2019s been a few minutes, and the focus has been on being dizzy (not often), falling (I don\u2019t), getting lost (not that either), safe. (Well there are five dogs, but other than that. Oh, and I do trip over a dog from time to time, especially if I stand up too fast).  And then the entire clock conversation.  But the \u201cBIG\u201d question comes back up  – what were those three words again.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I hadn\u2019t thought about them, didn\u2019t create a mnemonic to remember them, like the phases of cell replication that my freshman Biology teacher Mr. Sproul taught us \u2013 Pre Med at Texas (prophase, metaphase, anaphase and telophase \u2013 with interphase in the middle).  And maybe that\u2019s a clue to \u201cMedicare\u201d age: I can remember Pre Med at Texas, and the five members of the Rolling Stones (Jagger, Richards, Woods, Watts, and Wyman), but for a brief moment there\u2019s this blank in my head, a pause.  I stall \u2013 \u201cdo they need to be in order?\u201d   (Here\u2019s your test \u2013 don\u2019t look back \u2013 what were the words??)   Then it\u2019s there:  xxxxx<\/strong><\/em>, xxxxx<\/em><\/strong>, and my least favorite food of all, xxxxx<\/em><\/strong>.  The tester nods, I am cleared from dementia for my first Medicare year: whew!!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Going Slow<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Next, it\u2019s onto the ECG, checking out my frequently confused cardiac system.  Remember, it\u2019s only 8 am, and I didn\u2019t work out before I came here.  And I\u2019ve been sitting around for a while.  I lay back on the table, watch the sticky tabs placed on my chest (why, oh why, do they keep those damn things in the refrigerator?) and relax as she hooks up the wires.  She runs the test, no paper rolls anymore, it’s now all onto a laptop.  Then she frowns, and says let\u2019s do that again.  So I get a little drowsier.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It seems my heart rate is at fifty-one, and it\u2019s confusing the computer program.  Now, given the situation, reclined, early morning, not enough of the super-high-insanely-tenacious <\/em>black coffee in my system, I\u2019m just glad my heart\u2019s breaking fifty.  I run low, from fifty-five years of workouts and low thyroid, and it kicks up just fine when I need it.  To get back to that dizzy question, the better shape I get in, the more often I\u2019ll get dizzy from a \u201chead rush\u201d, standing up too fast.  That\u2019s because I jump up in between beats and it takes a second for the blood to catch up.  Being in shape means fewer heart beats.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We don\u2019t go into any great explanation, but now there\u2019s a new \u201cterm\u201d in my chart \u2013 \u201cbradycardia<\/a>\u201d.  Click on the link – what used to be a goal when I was younger now sounds terrible.  It\u2019s really not; just being me, and the Doc isn\u2019t concerned.  It\u2019s not a thing.  But there\u2019s that word.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What Did You Say?<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

So my Doc, (he\u2019s about thirty-five, I picked one that I hope will outlive me), does the usual exam, listening to my heart and checking the numbers.  He says I\u2019m fine, and wonders if I have any concerns.  I tell him that I sometimes struggle to hear certain sounds, conversations in crowds, and the nine-year-old kid next door.  So he sets me up for a hearing test.  And that becomes the next Medicare \u201cchallenge\u201d.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The last time I was in an Ear, Nose and Throat specialist\u2019s office, I was fifteen and a wrestler.  Bob Rosenthal kneed me in the face during a wrestle-off , and my nose was definitely closer to the right side of my face than the left.  It took surgery, and a couple of weeks off of the mat, but old Doc Sidney Peerless got my nose back headed in the right general location.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So this week I went to an ENT here in Columbus (Peerless was in Cincinnati, and passed away at eighty-four in 2006) to get my hearing checked.  The first thing I noticed:  all of the staff speak loudly and annunciate carefully, not just to me, but to everyone in the room.  I guess if there\u2019s a place to speak up, the \u201cear doctor\u201d would be it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Buzzing my Ear<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

My first stop was for the \u201cdreaded\u201d hearing test.  You go into a sound proof booth and they seal a pair of tight fitting headphones on.  Then the tester goes outside, and you soon hear her disembodied voice through the headphones, giving instructions.  The first series are words, and your job is repeat them back to the tester.  They come in left, right, or both, at a speaking tone or a whisper.  Sometimes there\u2019s static in one ear and a word in the other.  And then there\u2019s the point where the whisper is so quiet, you\u2019re really not sure if you hear it, or just feel it, or it\u2019s imaginary.   Think how foolish you look, repeating words that aren\u2019t even there.  I try to make sure.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Then we switch to tones.  Some are high, some low, loud to soft, and sometimes, it becomes just an ethereal tinkling that might be a sound, or might be just your head messing with you.  When you hear it \u2013 say \u201cyes\u201d.  So it\u2019s hours (or maybe ten minutes) of yes-yes-yes-pause-maybe-yes as the tones go back and forth, like a Jimi Hendrix solo in stereo.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

When I practice meditation (not so often recently, I just fall asleep), I focus on one “spot” in the center of my brain, and quiet every other thought.  So here I was, focused on the center of my brain where the tone was just at the faint edge of my hearing.  Enlightenment and Nirvana (the place, not the musical group) couldn\u2019t have been far away, when a firm voice said \u2013 \u201cTHAT\u2019S IT\u201d.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019m Not Listening<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

My right ear is just fine.  My left ear is fine in the low to medium range.  Medium to high (the exact range of a nine year-old boy) it falls off, but not enough to require a hearing aid.  Why the left and not the right?  I\u2019m left handed, and when I officiate track meets, I have the starting pistol with a .32 caliber black powder shell about three feet from my left ear.  I usually wear electronic hearing \u201cmuffs\u201d that surpress the sound, but sometimes there\u2019s no time to get them on.  A couple of years of fifty shots a night, a couple of times a week, and my left ear is getting it.  Not quite \u201cshot\u201d yet \u2013 but in definite need of protection.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He says I\u2019ll have trouble hearing when the water\u2019s running, or in a bar.  Well, I\u2019ve been in trouble in bars before.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The doc says make sure the headgear\u2019s on.  I will.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Sunday Story Series<\/h5>\n\n\n\n