How long to you think you will live?

[lazygood4nothinbum]

I can understand the bold sentiments & brave talk behind taking high-caliber control of one's lifespan, but my grandfather's 14 years of dementia were among the happiest of his life. (Pneumonia at age 97.) I wonder if the "we" that we're all going to become will want to be forced to live up to our current standards, or if we'll look to the examples set by Hawking & Reeves. If the Internet is this much fun now, imagine how it'll be with personal jetcars & virtual-reality biofeedback circuits!

i know my talk is somewhat only brave now and i realize that i don't know how i will feel down the road. i mightn't even talk that way now if the detrimental prospects were just physical in nature (not that a.d. isn't physical).

as much as i enjoy a good time, the most important thing to me--and it has been the most important thing to me for as far back as i can remember thinking--is the ability to explore myself to see just who it is i think i am. for me that is the greatest gift of life, that is the revelation, that is humanity, to be able to face ourselves, to know ourselves, and maybe even to share what we know.

and so for me alzheimer's makes of life, at best, such a tease.

but even alzheimer's can be somewhat survived. for as much as mom lost, she never lost completely the sense of herself and she always recognized my love, all the way to her death when her organs simply shut down. but she was amazing. most i've seen--and i've seen many--do not seem to experience a.d. like that.

my brother has already predetermined that he will endure a.d. should it strike him. but he also has a wife and three kids to care for him so it might be "braver" now for him to make such a future decision but more practical than brave for me, a single guy with no kids, to make mine. certainly, even if i was willing to live like that, i will not get the extremely good care my mother received or that my brother can expect. in fact, it would not be too unlikely that i could be physically abused by some homophobic nurse's aid. so maybe my decision isn't so brave after all. perhaps i'm just protecting myself.

 

[Twinkle Toes]

There! You went and did it...made me feel bad for being such a whiner! Hawking is such a hero of mine. I know he has at least one more brilliant theory in him and I hope he's able to share it with the world. And Reeves was Superman! I hope to be able to live long enough to enjoy my nest egg.

I posted on another thread about long term care expenses for parents and it reminded me of the AZ thing again. Sorry, didn't mean to be a downer!

 

[Twinkle Toes]

I can understand the bold sentiments & brave talk behind taking high-caliber control of one's lifespan, but my grandfather's 14 years of dementia were among the happiest of his life. (Pneumonia at age 97.) I wonder if the "we" that we're all going to become will want to be forced to live up to our current standards, or if we'll look to the examples set by Hawking & Reeves. If the Internet is this much fun now, imagine how it'll be with personal jetcars & virtual-reality biofeedback circuits!

Well, now you've done it...gone and made me feel like a real whiner. Hawking is one of my heros. I'm sure he has at least one more brilliant theory, if he can just get it out of his brain and on paper. And Reeves is Superman! I really am looking forward to spending my nest egg...my spread sheet goes to 100.

I posted on a thread today about long term care expenses for parents and that's when the AD thing hit me in the face again. Didn't mean to be a downer. I usually only think of shooting myself if I have to sit through another "news" report about Anna Nicole or Britney Spears.

 

[Twinkle Toes]

Oops!

Dang new computer! That's twice now that I 've posted without even knowing it. Have to turn down that touch pad or something. Sorry guys!

 

[RetireeRobert]

Mom made it to 85, dad to 80. With medical advances, and my adopting a healthy lifestyle, and ER giving me "no stress", I figure to hang on into my 90's and will shoot for 100.

 

[jambo101]

3 of my grandparents made it to mid 90's,the one that smoked made it to 76.
Parents are in their mid 80's and gong strong.They both just bought themselves new cars..So my guess for me is mid 80's or if i dont give up cigars mid 70's.
However their are always lifes hidden cards that get dealt on a regular basis as an example 43,000 people in the USA lost their lives due to road accidents last year.

 

[Martha]

Our local solution to the desire to check out early is to die in a snowbank with a bottle of booze.

Frankly, I think most people who say they will not want to live in a nursing home, or with Alzheimers, or with other health problems, will end up changing their mind. Old age sneaks up on you and you adapt.

 

[Maurice]

I expect to check out in my mid-eighties, perhaps even earlier. DW should make it to mid-nineties. My spreadsheets plan to 90 usually.

 

[Zipper]

~ another 20 years.

I'm 64 now, in good health and no medical issues.

 

[Sandy]

I plan for 100. Both parents are in the mid 80's and still going, more slowly but on their own and doing what they want.

I never expected my mother to last this long: 50 year smoker (quit at 81), history of beign brain tumor, benign and cancerous breast tumors, bladder cancer, overweight, never exercised, not the best diet (could be worse). Father has the heart disease/diabetes combo but is well controlled. He has better health habits than mom, but had gained that 2lbs /year for 30 years, though started exercising about 10 years ago and lost some the excess weight.

With that history, I figure my own good diet, exercise, and weight control combined with better medicine now, I see 100 as a good round number for planning. Of course, there is always that bus that could run me down

 

[Sarah in SC]

I just finished Helen Nearing's Loving and Leaving the Good Life. You may remember she and Scott Nearing being the original hippie-back-to-nature-homesteaders. They wrote for Mother Earth in the 70's and were major radicals in their day.

Scott, about a month before his 100th birthday, just quit eating. He died purposefully fasting, after about a month and a half. Very interesting account of a peaceful end. Wonder if this happens more than we think, although the snowbank is compelling, Martha! Except I'd wait a long time for some snow down here!

Helen died at 90, and it was interesting to reflect on their long healthy life after reading the importance of the nutrition/exercise/commitment lifestyle preached in that new book, Younger Next Year. I highly recommend that book, BTW, especially for the menfolk. Same info your doctor has been saying for years, but in a dude-friendly format.

 

[TromboneAl]

Anything over 80 is frosting on the cake.

It may look like frosting, but it's actually drool.

 

[TromboneAl]

Although the online tests say I'll live to 102, if I sit and read a book for a few hours, I can be cold even though the wood stove is going and it is 75 degrees in the room. That's gotten worse, so I say if that's how I am at age 54, what's it going to be like when I'm 70?

 

[Nords]

Scott, about a month before his 100th birthday, just quit eating. He died purposefully fasting, after about a month and a half. Very interesting account of a peaceful end.

I'm going to have to read that one. My mother chose essentially the same exit from her pain associated with metastasized breast cancer and bone embrittlement. She died the morning after spouse & I flew in to be with her.

Helen died at 90, and it was interesting to reflect on their long healthy life after reading the importance of the nutrition/exercise/commitment lifestyle preached in that new book, Younger Next Year. I highly recommend that book, BTW, especially for the menfolk.

I enjoyed reading the book (especially its thoughfully reasoned advice like "Quit eating crap!!") but now my main motivation for exercising every day is to be able to invite Chris Crowley to visit us here in Hawaii-- so that I can kick his ass. Talk about being a whipping boy for the entire Boomer demographic.

Although the online tests say I'll live to 102, if I sit and read a book for a few hours, I can be cold even though the wood stove is going and it is 75 degrees in the room. That's gotten worse, so I say if that's how I am at age 54, what's it going to be like when I'm 70?

Like a Minnesota snowbank.

It's just your body voting for another trip to Hawaii...

 

[Twinkle Toes]

Although the online tests say I'll live to 102, if I sit and read a book for a few hours, I can be cold even though the wood stove is going and it is 75 degrees in the room. That's gotten worse, so I say if that's how I am at age 54, what's it going to be like when I'm 70?

Why do you think so many old folks move to the southern extremes of CA, TX, AZ and FL? Because it feels good to those old bones. We routinely spend the winter months in southern AZ and CA.

 

[HFWR]

SWAG...86!


I'm impressed with Prof. Hawking, but who really impresses me is his assistant.

Hawking: Mmmm hummbaaa tah rareee baboomph.

Assistant: (1.9^2*Cx)(L^Q-aB^-0.14)+1

 

[lazygood4nothinbum]

i had a wonderful friend who sped up the end of his deteriorating life with self-starvation. "why could i find a doctor to help end my dog's life," he told me near the end, "but no one will help me end mine." there's also at least four suicides in my family including the ol'man, years after his third open heart surgery (so it isn't as if he didn't try life first). granted, i'm not a hemingway but there was at least three consecutive generations of them. so the lifestyle is not quite unknown.

i might live the rest of my life having never moved aboard another boat. but it is comforting for me to know i can.

 

[kcowan]

When FIL died, he had been suffering from compression stress in his spine from a year earlier car accident. When we were cleaning out the house, we found a calendar in his bedside table with Xs on every day until December 23rd (he loved Christmas).

He collapsed Jan 5th and died in the hospital 3 days later.

 

[grumpy]

Here's the rub: If you decide you don't want to go down that same road, how do you know when to pull the plug.

The way I look at it is that I will err on the side of pulling the plug too early, rather than too late. If that means I give up the possibility of a few years of living with a reasonable quality of life in exchange for avoiding a few months of misery, so be it.

Grumpy

 

[Puzzley]

I'm using 92 for me, and 96 for my wife, even though she doesn't have the family longevity that I do, for our planning. My mother is still alive (although demented) at 98, her brother died a few years ago at 94, and my father's sister died at 95. My father died at 62, but from a non-genetic disease. My hope is that I can be like my uncle, who was vital and strong, still raising a garden at 94, when he had a stroke and was dead within 4 months. My mother has been in failing mental health since 87, but is still relatively healthy in body. I'll take an earlier death any day over a stint in the nursing home, demented.....

 

[Khan]

Why do you think so many old folks move to the southern extremes of CA, TX, AZ and FL? Because it feels good to those old bones. We routinely spend the winter months in southern AZ and CA.

My mother's father moved from NY to TX because of arthritis; my mother moved from NY to AL because of arthritis; I don't want to move south because of arthritis.

I'm considering a tactic someone here mentioned concerning a relative: retreating to one (relatively warm) room for most stuff during cold weather.

 

[USK Coastie]

No one on DW's side has made it past 80. Mil is 79 but has had AD for last 10 yrs. Mom went at 74 due to smoking 1 1/2 packs per day from 18 on. Her mom went at 100 after giving up smoking at 78, go figure. Mom's Dad went at 89. Dad still going strong at 88 just remarried and on his third wife. His dad went to 89 and his mom died from complications from an auto accident. Have planned for 92 but anything past about 85 will be a gift to enjoy

 

[Caoineag]

Well,hmmm. Great-grandfather was 92 when the parkinson's got him (just before the bone cancer would have), his wife made it to at least late 50's with breast cancer, grandmother is currently 60 something and my father's father died in his 60's (heart disease) I believe. Father is still alive and in his 40's.

My other side I only know that my great-grandmother must have hit 80, my grandfather is currently 80, my grandmother died of metasized cancer at age 72 and my mother died at age 36 of metasized cancer.

So if cancer doesn't get me, I should at least reach my 80's. Unfortunately, my father's line is passing genetic breast cancer (its hit every generation except grandmother and I) but we don't have anyone who survived it to test. My grandmother is currently in a study to see if they can delay onset with a pill.

Husband's side is riddled cancer too so most likely one of us will die fairly young (though he has a few old geezers in the gene pool as well). But I am planning on both of us living to 100 financially with no social security just to keep our bases covered.

The one bonus of our genetic pool is that only the great grandfather with (idiopathic) parkinson's and bone cancer ever ended up in a nursing home. Our diseases tend to kill quickly.

 

[sweetana3]

I plan on at least 90+. My mom is 85 and even with a hip replaced she healed very quickly. Her mind is fine as crazy as ever. Dad has never had any health or mental problems and at 83 is going strong and farming (puttering) at least 3 hours a day outside.

 

[martyb]

My dad died last year at 79. His dad died at 79. I'm seeing a pattern. Mom's dad died at 86, his wife (my grandma) at 66. My mom's still going strong at almost 78. Dad was still working in his one man barber shop up until almost immediately before he suddenly fell ill, went into the hospital & died. They ran every test under the sun on him and found NOTHING wrong. No alzheimer's, no cancer, no concussions, no high blood pressure, I mean NOTHING! The doctor said he was the healthiest person he'd ever seen go down like he did. At 79 years old, his eyesight, weigh, blood pressure, cholesterol and most other vitals put mine totally to shame. He had 20/20 vision after having cataract surgery years ago. Man, the guy really was amazing! I have seen him eat an entire 1/2 gallon of ice cream at a sitting, more than once but not get fat! I've seen him go into a seafood restaurant in S.C., order a fried flounder plate, eat it, and then order a fried shrimp plate and pretty much do that one in as well, though mayber not all the side items. Unreal. For no particular reason, I'm assuming I'll be checking out around the same age as my dad & his dad. Don't know why, just carrying on the family tradition, I suppose!