grow older better

Category: Health

Tis The Last Day Of April

OK, it is the last day of April but you know what? I still have to say that old rhyme to remember whether April has 30 or 31 days.

How many of you still have to say: 30 days hath September, April, June, and November?

But getting back to April. I am always reminded of the T.S. Eliot poem, the wasteland and the first paragraph of it.

“April is the cruelest month, breedinglilacs out of the dead land, mixingmemory and desire, stirringdull roots with spring rain.”

T.S. Eliot, The Waste Land

As one with a PhD in psychology, I know that suicide starts spiking in April. They go on rising through the rest of spring and into summer. Spring is a more suicide prone time of year than winter. One would think that the bleakness of winter would lead to more suicides, but it is spring that is the time of year when people commit suicide. I’m not going into all of that here. I’ve spent many years talking and giving workshops on suicide and suicide prevention. But it does peak now, and it’s something to be aware of. That could possibly be what Elliot is referring to as the cruelest month – but it doesn’t have to be cruel.

Spring is a beautiful time of year in the northern hemisphere. It’s when things start to bloom, colors start to appear. Birds are welcomed back – singing their joyful songs and building their nests.

Above is one kind of allium I planted last fall; there are several around my garden. The second kind has not fully opened. It is also purple – why, you might ask? Those are the two varieties that Costco had when I was there last Fall.

Above is an enlargement of a cardinal that I had been hearing and it finally sat still long enough for me to take a photograph. It was further away, so I enlarged just the portion of the picture where you can see the cardinal. They are very easy bird to spot because the male is bright red.

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But given it is the last day of April, I thought I would reflect back on this month. It started with my being engaged in a blog challenge to post every day, full well knowing I would not meet that challenge. [I do know my own history.]

But in getting prompts every day, I did start re-working on some projects that had already been half completed. It’s a very good thing for me.

Anything that gets me back to stuff that I haven’t finished in the past is good.

I also learned that I have to get better at writing faster. I was there at one point but because I got away from it, it was those use it or lose things, and I need to get back to writing and finishing blog posts more quickly. Which means that I have to reset my templates and get my head back into the blog post writing, or article writing, or short form writing. That again is a good thing and it will happen in May.

The biggest and best takeaway from April came as a major thought yesterday while attending some very relevant online business sessions. That I even sat through all the sessions that I sat through was remarkable because I have been so not into the business aspect of life these days.

A few of the concepts hit me smack in the head – and sometimes it takes a real smack in the head to make me realize what I should be doing, so I’m going to do it.

And I decided to give myself an award for my April inspirations – because why not?

04/30/2025
Growing Older Better

My Take On Aging

There is no golden ticket

There is no ticket, activity, pill, etc. that “magically” works to improve your aging process. There are many things that you can do and very often it takes all or many of them. It’s often trial and error to see what works for you. Buying into the hype of “this is what you need to be healthy if over 50” is usually not true.

It requires work

Movement is your friend. You don’t have to run like in the image but walking around is perfectly acceptable as is weightlifting, yoga, core work, Pilates, or anything that makes your body work, but the work is necessary. If you’re in a wheelchair or bedridden, be sure to check what kind of exercise you can and are able to do.

And a bit of a caveat here it helps if you start moving when you’re younger, but it’s never the wrong time to start moving.

It requires good nutrition

Good nutrition does not mean expensive food. In fact, one of the most nutritious and least expensive foods is beans. If you have dietary restrictions, you have to think about that – if you have a garden, you can grow a lot of nutritious food. You don’t even actually need a garden – you can grow in pots. I did container gardening for years. There’s a lot of good food out there, but be a label reader – that is important. That’s too long a conversation to have for now. I’ll come back to this at another time.

It requires using your brain

Keeping your cognitive activity working is something that also helps with aging. So keep [or start] doing things like crossword puzzles, or most any kind of puzzle, learning new things, going to classes, or doing classes via apps or online.

04/05/2025
This Makes Me Happy

The above photo is a northern cardinal – Photo by Patrice Bouchard – from unsplash

I’ve been thinking of late – since spring weather has arrived – that I really like hearing birds chirping, and watching flowers come into bloom. Being in nature has always been my happy place and that’s a good place for me right now – and it might be a good place for many of us!!

This morning when I was out with my dog, I heard a lot of birds. I did not see them even though the trees don’t have leaves yet but with the dog around, they stay pretty far away like on the neighbor’s property. But I hear them – and I’m beginning to recognize the sounds of the different birds. Many are new to me!

Here is a recording from this morning.

I use the Merlin app [https://merlin.allaboutbirds.org] which identifies by sound or photo and it told me those sounds today came from:

Northern cardinal, Carolina wren, European starling, Dark-eyed Junco, Tufted titmouse, Red-winged blackbird, Blue jay, White-breasted nuthatch, Red-bellied woodpecker, and Cedar waxwing/// WOW!!

On my phone, when I replay the sound recording, it shows a picture and gives the name of the bird making the sound. It does that also while it’s recording, but this way I can listen afterwards and match sounds with pictures because occasionally I do see the birds – when I don’t have my dog out there with me.

And a few hours after hearing the birds, my tulips started blooming.

Go find your happy place….

04/03/2025
Getting Back On Track

Or actually I should say – getting back on the treadmill!

Last year I did training for a 5K. We did it online and it was through an organization where I used to live. It was fun and it did actually get me exercising so I signed up again this year.

This is the 6th week of the 12 weeks of training – and I just got started. [SIGH]

It’s been that kind of existence since I started packing to move – last Spring.

Last year I used my indoor bike for training, this year I was going to walk, thinking that maybe by next year I could try running.

But as I said many things got in the way including really wild weather and power outages and so walking outside became something I was not going to do on a regular basis – except for the dog walks…but that’s not training.

I was going to go to a gym but car issues and other things including ice and wind storms [and inertia] kept me away – but then an at-home treadmill was acquired – and I got going.

Above is my view when I am on the treadmill. It does make using the treadmill much more pleasant than if I went to the gym where they have a TV to watch.

And the getting going on the treadmill and back to the training will get me back on track with my writing and course creation….and the other ideas and products I want to get out this year.

01/04/2023
My Brain, My Eyes, and Cataract Surgery

a whole lotta learnin’ goin’ on

It has been one year since I had cataract surgery and so much has happened in this time with the communications between my brain and my eyes that I felt the need to write about it — I hope you all find it as intriguing as I did.

I know that eyes and brains are intimately hooked up. I took a neuropsychology course in graduate school and I’m sure I learned about brains and vision in high school and college.

I know the basics of how my brain and my eyes work together. And I know it’s complicated!

But – knowing this and going through a relearning process post-cataract surgery are two different phenomena. My brain was not ready for the onslaught of new information that it was getting.

[I contemplate the workings of my brain a lot — so I found it fascinating to be aware of what was going on.]

A bit of my eye background….

I am astigmatic — oops change that — I WAS astigmatic. I am also far-sighted. At one forgotten point in my life, my astigmatism was bad enough that I needed glasses most all of the time because my astigmatism issues were fixable with glasses.

At another also now forgotten point in life, my driver’s license got marked with “needs corrective lenses” which didn’t surprise me because I was wearing glasses every minute of being awake.

I did not like wearing glasses all the time and tried contact lenses, but mostly they didn’t work or they fell out or they were annoying — but I liked the idea of not having glasses on so I kept trying different contacts and finally gave up on those because the annoyance factor won out.

Then I developed cataracts which happens to many as we age. Of course, the cataracts got worse as they are prone to do, and those, along with my astigmatism made it very difficult to drive at night. I’m a good driver and I did not wish to create problems for me or anyone else so I stopped driving at night and decided it was time for cataract surgery.

[That in itself is yet another issue..why insurers balk at cataract surgery baffles me.]

Back to my brain and eyes….

Over years of driving – back and forth across the USA, across Canada, driving day and night in snow, sleet, rain, and all sorts of weather and driving conditions, my brain learned how to deal with changes in light, changes in weather, and frequently, a quick change in any or all of these things. My brain and eyes were perfectly in sync.

For example, if I got to a tunnel my brain knew that it was going to take a nanosecond to adapt from light to dark and it knew how to do that, and I knew it knew how to do that and we were safe while going into tunnels. Ditto when skiing in bright sun bouncing off the snow and then going into a ski lodge — my brain and eyes figured it out and it never was an issue.

Then came the cataract surgery — YEA — and pre-surgery, I decided that the lens that also corrected astigmatism would be best for me and my eyes!

More YEA!

My weaker eye [left] got done first, and the subsequent difference between my left and right was very discombobulating — even with my now one lens glasses on for the right eye — it was no fun to do much of anything. Two weeks later I had the right eye done and suddenly both eyes were perfect — and balanced.

I was binocular, bionic — I could see. It was a fascinating experience and I was in constant amazement that I could see very far, further than I remembered I used to be able to do. It was one of those “I forgot how good my eyes used to be because I got so used to them not being too good” kind of moment!

Every. Time. I. Looked. Anywhere.

Then I started driving. It was weird, especially as I have been driving forever! This is when I really noticed that my brain had a lot of work to do and I was fascinated by the interchanges between my eyes, my conscious brain, and my subconscious brain. They were putting together a new reality.

At first, I only did daytime driving because I quickly recognized that I needed time for the brain and eyes to adjust to the new norm. It was pretty quick learning as I was driving on very familiar roads and did not make any “road trips.”

Then came a time where I again drove through a tunnel. A very short tunnel, one I have been through a lot — but still — a tunnel. The brain went: “Get ready for dark. Get ready for dark adaptation” — followed instantaneously by: “Wow — nothing happened, everything is fine.”

By the third or fourth time through that tunnel that I realized there was no longer any “discussion” going on between my eyes and my brain about that situation.

It was when I started driving distances, and at night , that I realized the brain and eyes were still trying to figure something out. The first night-time drive, where I was also in traffic, with headlights coming at me and behind me — the brain was like “Wow the eyes can see everything again. I have nothing to do.” No issues at all. And my subconscious brain registered that fact.

The conscious brain, though, was still asking itself questions and waiting for answers!

Because I live in the Northwest we have rain — not a lot when I was newly driving again, but enough with some added oddball Spring weather — like thunderstorms, drizzle, and weather that puts you on alert that traffic, lighting, and road conditions might change — and the brain and eyes were coordinating easily about this — the conscious brain was still going: “We got to get ready for this” but it was then an immediate: “Nope, we don’t have to do anything.”

After weeks of driving under different circumstances, my conscious brain began to relax and not be in the “we have to get ready for something” mode anymore. It had had many many years of dealing with astigmatism, eyeglasses, and the issues that came with both and now it no longer had those issues to contend with and was finally exiting learning mode.

Over Spring, Summer, Fall and now Winter, my eyes, brain and I have driven in many different conditions. Fog, heavy rain, heavy traffic, highway traffic, traffic circles, road construction, to places I had never been, etc. I saw that we are fine! We are cool! We are coordinated! We are good to go!

My brain had obviously been going back and retrieving what it used to know from pre-glasses and early-glasses learnings — those memories are still there in spite of years of inaction or not needing to be accessed.

Most of the time we don’t pay attention to the connection between our eyes and brain. I certainly never did. And then: WOW did I pay attention!!

It has been fun! It has certainly has been interesting! And – it has been very educational!

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Healthy Aging

01/26/2020