The truth about growing old with the one you love

Sometimes, just as you were hoping for a little less to do, you realize that reality is not scripted by Hallmark.

By Charles E. KrausUpdated February 23, 2023, 12:00 p.m.

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Professional caregivers come for 16 hours a week. For the other 152 hours, ensuring the safety and wellbeing of my ailing wife is my job.NITO/ADOBE

My wife and I have been married for over 50 years. She is not all that well.

She’s been through four, count ’em, four hip replacements, two back surgeries, a new knee — 10 major operations in the past 20 years. She is dealing with arthritis, sleeping issues, and a certain amount of trouble remembering. Side note: Mechanically speaking, both of our hearts are past warranty.

My merely sufficient caregiving skills lose their credibility as the day drags on. I tire. Get frustrated. Upset with circumstances. Some problems do not appear to have solutions. I relegate my own needs and interests, their urgency lessened, tempered by the part of me that cannot commit to them because I’m “on alert.” Might be beckoned. Should be checking. You OK? You take your meds? Where is your walker?

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My wife falls. Often. I’m in the other room, or standing right next to her. One minute she’s vertical, the next she’s sprawled on the kitchen floor. We are going to look at wheelchairs as soon as we receive the prescription from her doctor. But for now, the physical therapist has “taught” her how to right herself. To crawl to a chair or the edge of the bed and work her way up.

I assist, coach, am ready to call someone. Did you hit your head? Do you need to see a doctor?

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You ever visit the ER in the middle of the night? Get your wife into the car, sit in the waiting room along with throngs of others who are competing for medical attention. You listen for her name, eventually called, only to be told things are OK, or OK enough, and that she should contact her physician in the morning. What was more dangerous: the fall or venturing out in the night?

Amazingly — perhaps due to a dozen or so medications, physical therapy, counseling, caring doctors, kind and loving input from our children, intermittent visits from home health caregivers — most of the time my wife functions well, comes across as her smart, personable, responsible, “normal” self. Unfortunately, the on/off switch operates by its own illogic, thrusting her from self-contained to in-need-of-assistance with random regularity.

Professional caregivers step in when there are things that need doing. Light housekeeping is part of the job description. Meal prep. Helping with showers, drives to medical appointments, and various assorted tasks of living. The agency sends associates twice a week for eight hours at a clip. We could ask for more. We may. But selfishly, we enjoy our privacy.

How would you feel having caregivers — nice people, but basically strangers — inhabiting your home, waiting for something to do while you try to go about your quasi-independent life? I believe the assignment requires someone else to cover the other 150+ hours of each week. I’m that person.

Caregiving is often a standby activity, a from-time-to-time and throughout-the-course-of-the-day occupation. Can you pull up the blanket, help me stand, sit, put together a snack, a meal, remind me when it’s time to take my meds, remind me to use my walker, keep me from attempting unsafe activities, from trying to carry a cup of coffee in one trembling hand while manipulating the walker with the other? Help me remember how to spell, calculate, recall a procedure? Find my phone, my pills, my glasses, my book?

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We use tools. The walker. The cellphone whenever we are apart. The pendant — a necklace with a panic button that, if pressed, triggers a Wi-Fi network to alert emergency personnel somewhere in the Midwest who respond via a dedicated intercom. “Hello, are you OK? Should we call 911?” Having the system is reassuring, but I wonder what would happen if my wife took a serious spill and was unable to press the button. Still, I make sure she is wearing her necklace when I am out of the house.

Living a long life requires adjusting over time. Downsizing expectations. And sometimes, just as you were hoping for a little less to do, for a graceful meander into fewer obligations, you realize that reality is not scripted by Hallmark.

Charles E. Kraus is the author of “You’ll Never Work Again In Teaneck, N.J.”

 

Doing your own writing offers a certain pride of ownership that AI cannot match: Charles E. Kraus

Published: Feb. 15, 2023, 5:45 a.m.

By Guest columnist Charles Kraus

SEATTLE -- I love writing. As far as I’m concerned it is the best game, the most engaging puzzle, and one of the more rewarding activities that I get to experience. It is being in the moment for hours at a time. I work on a paragraph, section, chapter, look up and find that afternoons have passed. And at some point, when I’ve shaped my thoughts and am ready to send them into the world, I feel a sense of accomplishment.

Take a deep breath, Charles, and walk off the field knowing you’ve used your skills, engaged your mind, functioned at capacity.

As you may have guessed, I’m not a fan of AI writing software. Artificial intelligence is a short cut that can be valuable if you are in a hurry, but that depersonalizes the finished product and cheats you out of the pride of ownership that comes from being a ‘do it yourself’ writer.

“Oh my.”

That’s me reacting to what I put into words. Me reflecting on the way I organize my thoughts then total them into summation. Suddenly I realize how I feel about the topic at hand.

During my student days, the scribbles I put on paper mirrored the authors I happened to be reading. And like most beginners, my efforts yielded meager results. Turned out, I wasn’t Kerouac, or Salinger. And S.J. Perelman needn’t worry about my taking his place at the New Yorker.

Over time, all the styles and approaches I tried out merged into a version that offered more of me and less of those I’d been emulating.

Early on, I benefited from a certain amount of guidance. To this day, when editing a first draft, I hear my late father’s voice going over the material. Asking me to find a better word, to improve a convoluted sentence. To clarify. To write tight. This process offers two benefits, an improved draft, and the pleasure of yet again working on a project with my dad.

One of my first attempts at an extended piece of writing was a 97 page “novel” that I concocted when I was about fifteen.

My handwriting was atrocious, even then. And my misspellings barely reached the phonetic equivalent of any known language. The entire effort was a juvenile homage to J.D. Salinger. I mentioned the manuscript to my English teacher, a wonderful, supportive man who asked to see it. Then held on to it for several weeks.

When finally returned, I found that he’d gone through my entire text, correcting spelling, suggesting changes, praising a passage or two, and more than anything else, giving me the sense that what I had put on paper was worth my effort and worth the time he’d spent editing.

I got a little older and life took me away from home. It turned out I was quite the correspondent.

This was before computers; before the internet. I’d draft a letter. Type it up for friend No. 1. Retype it with minor changes for friend No. 2, repeating this process -- typing, adjusting, generally improving, each version so that by the time I’d pounded out copy No. 20, the contents had been perfected.

There are many ways to improve your writing. I don’t necessarily recommend this one. Just write until you’ve done your best.

The results will be YOUR best. They’ll speak to a certain pride of ownership.

AI is lawn mowing. Writing it yourself is gardening.

Charles E. Kraus is the author of “You’ll Never Work Again In Teaneck, N.J.” He writes from Seattle.