I don't feel old.

Ok fuck it, I might as well be honest; sometimes I feel old.

I'm fit and generally healthy - it takes effort - but not quite as fit and healthy as I was in my mid 20's to mid 30's. Time weighs on a person I guess and what we do with our bodies, the demands we make on them in our younger years, take a toll and I definitely asked a lot of mine. I've needed operations to rectify damage and injuries and have had to curb enthusiasm for some of the more demanding physical actions that in my younger days I'd have simply done without question.

I'm ok with it because I'm still rockin' it...just a little differently...more passively and with more care for things that I know could occur should I push too far.

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Oldmanoblems

Last Saturday I met a friend for coffee in the early morning. It was a struggle as I've been suffering with the flu (knocked me around a bit) but I got up early and we caught up.

We were supposed to play squash but I wasn't up to it so we chatted about the old days and all those stories people who have done things that most never have the chance to do tend to have. It was enjoyable but we ended up moving on to the fact that those things are firmly in the past - certainly in the ways and intensity in which we used to do them. Sad? Nah, not really because we lived well, attacked life with our full effort, and have no, or few, regrets.

But...then we started talking about oldmanoblems.

As humans age physical and mental ability diminishes; people experience it in greater and lesser degrees, sooner or later in life and in many different ways but what's common is that should one happen to live long enough the mind and body will degrade. It's not just a man thing either of course.

In the animal kingdom, the weak, infirm and elderly who cannot keep up fall and either die of starvation or are are prey for other animals. Humans were the same I guess, but not anymore, they're cared for. Either way, problems happen and we have to deal with them. So, my mate was talking about his oldmanoblems.

He's a few years older than I am and his biggest oldmanoblem is his enlarging prostate gland which he was whining about like a little bitch; poor fucker. Add in failing eyesight requiring laser treatment, arthritis in his hands and fingers and a knee issue that has never been good since he blew it out on a deployment plus his slowing mind...the last is in his opinion only, not diagnosed. He's a tough guy though and pushes on despite these problems.

These and other things are so typical for many and for most men well, it's a scientific fact that the prostate will enlarge over time and possibly cause issues, and then there's prostate cancer as well - kills about 3700 Australians men every year. Fuck!

I don't like talking about oldmanoblems, it cuts too close to the bone considering my age of 154 years old; but I think it's important to share the burden of dealing with them because failing to do so can give rise to other issues, mental health issues, and that's especially so for men who tend not to open up about things as readily. I listened to my mate talk, discussed some of my own concerns like the reality of being a type-1 diabetic, something that went completely undiagnosed for many years and cut 10-15 years off my projected life expectancy, and how I've dealt with it. It was a good talk.

We're both go-getters, we don't sit back and wait for things to fall on silver platters held out in expectant hands; we work hard, earn what we have and that means our health (lives) as well. It's not easy but we only have one life so figure it deserves some effort. That doesn't mean bad things, issues and problems, won't arise, just that we're more able to deal with them or the ramifications of them when they do. Hopefully.

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I know so many people who feel more comfortable sweeping issues under the rug, out of sight out of mind, but that's not the best way to go with one's health, physical or mental, in my opinion.

What do you think? Do you prefer to ignore health issues altogether or do you stand up and face them? Do you open up and talk about your issues to help process them and work towards planning for and around them? Are you careless towards your own or other people's issues or do you apply empathy and care, attention and importance to them?

If you'd like to comment then go ahead, if you don't care to comment then don't waste your time.

Note: Oldmanoblems, was not formerly a word until I made it up for the purpose of this post. Now it's a word.