Hw 29 - Reading And Noting Basic Materials

Process of Dying:

As stated by my previous blog posts, I believe the process of dying to be broken up in to stages. I believe there is the initial reaction to being diagnosed with what will be leading you on your journey to death, followed  by your mental/physical coping, and finally with the acceptance of your fate. Demonstrating an example  of an initial reaction to a diagnosis, is a quote from "Tuesdays With Morrie" by Mitch Albom: (Page 8) "Shouldn't the world stop? Don't they know what has happened to me?", were the immediate words of Morrie after his diagnosis with Lou Gehrig's disease. This quote demonstrates how the process of dying produces a discovery of the world around you, the world continues as you start to die, and the realization that you must live your life on your own terms and not everyone Else's, occurs.

Continuing on my take of the "stages of dying", the second and third stages (mental/physical coping & acceptance of your fate) can also be demonstrated by a quote from "Tuesdays With Morrie" by Mitch Albom. (Page 81) Morrie says "Yes. But there's a better approach. To know you're going to die, and to be prepared for it at any time. That's better. That way you can actually be more involved in your life while you're living." Morrie demonstrates his understanding of the fact that he will die, and has a coping method of "being more involved" as he said.

Isolation:

In our society, the dying, ill and elder people are almost always isolated. Whether or not, it's for their own good or not. The sick or dying are avoided because of fear of "contagious  death" and the elderly have the wonderful privilege of being a part of an industrial nightmarish atrocity, nursing homes. Our society as whole, has learned to send the sick to a doctors or emergency room, and to send the elderly to a nursing home or a hospice, or give them special care. Due to this unintentional isolation, we have learned  to treat the sick and dying different than the socially normal. Nursing homes in particular, demonstrate isolation based on health. Nursing homes are viewed by so many as a good place for elders to be treated or to die in, yet the way they are all housed together, and isolated are looked down upon. The fondness of nursing home is demonstrated well by the quote of a nursing home resident herself: "How to be sick" by Toni Bernhard, (Page 10) " If one is to be sick and alone, this is as good a place as any".

Being sick:

Based on my personal experience with being sick, I believe that being sick is taken for granted and underestimated by most. When I experience a common cold, I get annoyed, want it to go away, and treat it based on my symptoms. However; What if someone with an immune system that is compromised has the very same cold as me? What if my same innocent, annoying cold was a life threatening, unbearable virus to someone else? Sickness isn't fully respected nor understood for most people, we go about being sick as something that is normal and will go away, because of this, we aren't prepared for when people around us are terminally ill.

When asked by me, My grandmother said, "I think being sick affects you and everyone around you, mentally, physically, and spiritually" In conjunction with my grandmother's opinion, I believe that not only do the fatal diseases affect you on a mental, physical, and spiritual level but also the small inconvenient colds, infections,etc. Sickness shouldn't be judged differently according to the severity of the condition, because it that exact same underestimation that leads to our society being unprepared to handling being sick or terminally ill.

Hw 28 - Comments 2

For Jessica,

Jessica, this is overall a good post, but I think to make it even stronger you need to add in your perspective about it. How is she an inspiration to you? What do you admire about her? Do you think she should of handled her situation differently? Just add that in, also check your grammar, such as the second word in your last paragraph is "till", you should fix that, among other spelling mistakes. :)


For Sam,


Since barely anyone in my group did this, I'll comment yours...
I think this is a great story, just watch out for the small grammar mistakes, like not capitalizing your "i's". Also try to connect this to the book you read during this unit, and see what connections you can make between him and a character in your book.

Hw 27 - Visiting An Unwell Person

For this assignment, I referred to a family member of mine who has diabetes. I wouldn't put him under the category of "dying", however diabetes is a condition that requires constant attention, and can be fatal if it isn't monitored correctly. I thought back to before he was diagnosed with diabetes, to after his diagnosis, and it is very apparent that the condition has made him much more cautious. Prior to the diagnosis he had an attitude as if he was indestructible, I would rarely hear him talk about a medical problem or an issue he was concerned about, in my eyes he was as healthy as he thought he was.

However, the time following the diagnosis of diabetes changed his entire way of thinking. I took notice of the slight signs of concern he had, such as the fact that he now brings sweet, sugar filled candies with him in the car just in case his blood-sugar level fell dangerously low. Amongst these small subtle changes of routine for him, were the more apparent changes in his daily life; he than needed to test his blood sugar levels using a small tester that would give him a small poke on his finger and test his blood.

The period of time right after his diagnosis was the time that made me most connect to "Tuesdays With Morrie" by Mitch Albom. Prior to Morrie's diagnosis, he was a man with a very strong persona and was not dependent of anyone for his health until he needed the help of the people around him to maintain his health. In my family member's case, he also became more dependent on people around him such as his wife to give him the blood sugar test. He also gave his sons, along with me a brief plan of what to do in case he passes out from having a low blood sugar level. The dependency shown by him was very similar to that of Morrie in my opinion, especially since it was such a large change in such a short amount of time.

Of course with him being my family member, I needed no "visit", instead I used my normal weekend stays at his house (Including this Christmas and new years eve/day) and combined them in to my interpretation of his situation. Ultimately, I can safely say his condition does not threaten any of our family because we know how to treat it and handle it, however there are the changes that we must all adapt to in order to help him cope with diabetes.