Mel Walsh

The Spring Blessing Count

It’s spring and the rump is sprung, at least if you are older and have lower back troubles. But when the daffodils are waving at you, it’s hard to focus on the pain that can come with aging and much easier to focus on the pleasures of growing older. So today, now that we have passed the vernal equinox and gotten the flu and the winter blues behind us, let us count our blessings.

Blessing One: We are alive. (Now don’t say “duh”! because the reality is that just about one hundred years ago, Americans lasted on average only until their late 40’s.) Women hardly had time to get all hot and menopausal. Men had no time to play retirement golf badly. Both were pushing up daisies, so there was no great need for a program like Social Security. Not that many people lived long enough to need it.

Blessing Two: We have a better chance than ever of reaching really old age still able to enjoy life. Treatments for chronic health problems now exist, therapies that help us to be feisty 80, 90 and 100-year-olds. How many of those elders were around when you were young? I did not know one person over 72. In our family, we would have sold tickets if we got anyone over 80.

Blessing Three:  Yeah, our hips and knees give out as do our eyes and shoulders. But and however, hip and knee replacements can restore people to full function. So can shoulder and eye surgery. Many of us would be using guide dogs to tell us where to drive our wheelchairs if it weren’t for the blessing of modern surgery.

Blessing Four: As much as we fear being bag ladies and guys, it is not likely we will go hungry or homeless in our old age. Yes, retirement shrinks the income and some have mortgage or rent trouble, but most of us most of the time will not be sleeping under freeway bridges or searching dumpsters for slices of cold pizza.

Blessing Five: There’s lots to do that is either significant, absorbing or fun. If you are bored when you’re older, you just don’t have your arms open to receive gifts such as volunteering, creative endeavors, geezer sports or the glory of seeing political candidates on immense flat screen TV’s. (Just kidding about that. With heads and mouths almost at life size, that is actually scary.) But the world needs your help and also, isn’t there a creative genius lurking inside? To be happy, you do need meaningful, rewarding occupation. And they are there for the taking---a blessing each one.

Blessing Six: We live in the Light Ages now. Anything you want to know you can pretty much find on the Internet. So there is no reason to be the clueless codger of the stereotype, the person who keeps up on nothing. Now you can track news, health issues, financial information and travel info, to say nothing of the fact that you can find companionship on the social sites and also email unsolicited advice to your grandkids. (If you haven’t yet fallen for a computer, get in touch with the volunteers at the Gold Country Computer Learning Center. They’ll adjust your attitude so painlessly you won’t even know it. 530/272-0497 or www.gcclc.org.)

Blessings Seven and Eight: Paul Newman and Sophia Loren are still alive.

Words for the Wise

            When you can’t fall asleep at night because you can’t figure out what Governor Spitzer was thinking when he threw it all away, think instead about your blessings. More interesting to count them than sheep. Really.

So how high a blessing count can you get? Well, it’s fair to count good meatloaf, the daffodils, Fluffy, money in the bank, stretch jeans, Medicare, the Yuba River, the county libraries, free speech, George Clooney and the Easter Bunny.

            So I got you started here, but I hope you never finish this list and that’s a blessing too: a blessing list with no end in sight. Enjoy, and may there be many chocolate rabbits in your basket this weekend.       

            

Mel Walsh is a gerontologist and certifiable geezer. Her book of advice for older women, Hot Granny, is available at The Book Seller in Grass Valley and online at Amazon and Barnes & Noble.

The New Old Vitamin

            The swami says you are about to get excited about vitamin D.

Hey, I used to think vitamin D was dull, too. In fact, since I didn’t have rickets, I didn’t think about vitamin D at all. Well, if that’s true of you too, it’s time for both of us to wake up and smell the new data that are coming out about vitamin D, information that can change our lives and health.

There is a large and growing body of evidence that many people are deficient in vitamin D---their tanks are low. Several studies show that from 40 to 100% of US and European older people have insufficient levels of vitamin D. So think: common, very common deficiency. And that low level can be harmful, increasing muscle weakness and even increasing the risk of cancer and other diseases.

On the other hand, adequate levels of vitamin D may protect against colon, prostate and breast cancer and one study of 50,000 men at the Harvard School of Public Health suggests that higher vitamin D levels lower the risk of all cancers by at least 30%.

So Who Knew About Falls and Vitamin D?

The role of vitamin D in preventing falls is astonishing. In a randomized controlled trial---which is the kind good scientists do---nursing home residents who were given 800 IU of vitamin D per day plus calcium had a 72% reduction in the risk of falls compared with the placebo group in a study that lasted five months. Well, it makes sense. If the lack of vitamin D can lead to weak muscles, adequate levels could mean a stronger, steadier person.

Lack of vitamin D has also been linked to type 1 diabetes, multiple sclerosis, hypertension and cardiovascular disease. If you want to know more, a very thorough article about vitamin D deficiency appears in The New England Journal of Medicine, July 19, 2007, by Michael Holick, M.D., Ph.D. and them’s no creds to sneeze at.

How to Get Vitamin D

First, think sun. Yes, we’ve been told to fear the sun because of skin cancer, but now, other doctors who are not dermatologists are arguing we need to arrive at a more balanced view of sun exposure. What the medical community is trying decipher: how to get vitamin D levels up to where they should be at the same time protecting our skin. Dr. Holick has this recommendation: “Exposure of arms and legs for 5 to 30 minutes (depending on time of day, season, latitude, and skin pigmentation) between 10 a.m. and 3 p.m, twice a week”---which any of us could do by putting on shorts and a tee shirt to take the dog for a walk.

Dermatologists, long enemies of the sun, but now aware of the benefits of vitamin D, are still recommending only vitamin supplementation and food sources such as salmon and cod liver oil. When it comes to taking vitamins, the current official recommendation is not over 600 IU’s a day, but that may be changing to 800 IU a day. Stay tuned to the debate, for the issue will be taken up by the USDA as more and more science comes in about the benefits of vitamin D and the bad things that happen when we don’t have enough.

And we thought we were home-free if we didn’t have rickets.

Words for the Wise

A quick footnote: low vitamin D and calcium levels lead to soft bones and that in turn can lead to bone pain. To quote Dr. Holick: “One study showed that 93% of persons 10 to 65 years of age who were admitted to a hospital emergency department with muscle aches and bone pain and who had a wide variety of diagnoses, including fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue syndrome, and depression, were deficient in vitamin D”.