Why do I write? Because I have to. Nothing else is going to lift me out of this deep fog, that is threatening to become bigger and bigger. Or am I in a big hole right now, so that I have to struggle and struggle, to get out of it? But it seems, like only some minutes ago I was still rather happy in myself. I had absolutely no worries, that I couldn’t cope with. None what so ever. How can a mood change so quickly, I wonder. What brought that on? I was pretty resilient. Not anymore. How can that be? I do not understand myself.
Do I need to get some counselling now, or what? In the past some counselling by people I felt close to, has always helped me. Where are these people now? Is this a sign of very old age, that the people, that could help me now, have vanished from my sight? I still want my life to end soon, but why can I not live my last few days being happy and joyful the way I was until very recently? I was so looking forward to a joyful, high spirited passing!
Can I tell people, that I feel, it is better for me to pass away very soon rather than to struggle just to stay alive. When I tell people this is how I feel, would they just tell me, I need treatment for depression?
Where, oh where can I see the light in the tunnel? Until very recently I felt very happy to be living on my own at home. So, what has changed all of a sudden? How can I be so vulnerable? For nothing much has changed really. It is all in my mind.
I thought, Peter, my deceased husband, would want me to live the last few days of my life in as joyful a manner as possible. He must have known, how hard it would turn out to be for me, for he was devestated to leave me on my own. For a lot of the time, I thought, I did pretty well. However it was not to be for me to live a carefree, happy life all the time.
Just some tiny upsets can make me feel like I’m getting severe blows. How can that be? I have really everything a woman my age could wish for. So, I thought, I am very lucky, as lucky as can be. I should be grateful, that I can still enjoy everything in my life. And I was grateful, very grateful. So what has changed? I really could not tell you. It is my rapid aging, I think. It is so overwhelming, and coming on very, very suddenly, much too suddenly.
You can’t tell me, there is a cure for this rapid aging. Indeed. all this aging gets worse by the minute! And it is all natural. Isn’t it natural too, that I don’t want to do anything to prolong my life? If I get very low or very high blood pressure, who is to tell me I should get treatment for this? Treatment is to let me live a bit longer. Why should I want this?
Strangers, who look at me, say I am doing alright. I could live many more years. They do not see, what I feel like inside. I can very well hide, how I really feel. When I talk to my family about my feelings, they don’t believe me that I really want my life to end at any time very soon. I can’t think of anything, that would be likely to change my mind about wanting to die soon.
AuntyUta 
All the typing mistakes show, how bad my eye-sight is getting. And sadly I was not able to change my wrting into a larger print.
Hello, Uta…I should imagine…and that is all I can do…imagine that it must be terribly distressing for you to suffer such sadness….perhaps it is the contrary situation that you are TOO healthy in an intellectual way so that you are so aware of your aging situation, rather than suffering..like so many aged people..from a form of dementia that diminishes the awareness of the situation you find yourself in…a terrible conundrum…and one I fear in myself as I too head into this aging business…
But let me say a word in defence of your still being alive to “enjoy” the moments…Last week, my elder brother passed away suddenly…he was diagnosed with a heart attack, but upon doing a scan at the hospital, they found his body riddled with cancer that he did not even know he had…nor it seems felt symptoms of..in his liver, lungs, lesions on the brain as well…and he just dropped like an Autumn leaf…just before Christmas…he was 75yrs.
So what can one say…it is not to our choosing that some live on to an extreme old age while some just pass away…Your situation, Uta, seems to be the latter…there is no cure..and really no-one else to live your life for you…you are your own “experiment” at surviving and all the pain, fears, trials and tribulations that you go through..along with all the family joy and best wishes are there for you only to have…we who watch and read your posts can but hold our breath as you “ride the wild bull” of living out your life while we who have not the security of even knowing we will reach your noble age are “taking notes” to guide us on that (hopefully) same journey…and what more can I say…but I DO hope you have a wonderful Christmass gathering with your progeny….(arrows in the quiver).
You’re amazingly perceptive, dear friend. A quiver shows strong emotions, right? I believe I do have extremely strong emotions! 🙂 But I also have an immensely strong mind. Not many people can cope with that combination in an severely aged person. 🙂
I do find a lot of relief in writing something, and I don’t care when not very many people are interested in what I have to write. I just received a very thoughtful email from my granddaughter Natasha. She may very well be the most thoughtful person in my whole mob. However, I know, they all love me very much, and this is so heartbreaking, for I really do not want to live out my live until I am demented or something.
I am sorry about your brother, Joe. Maybe for him it was a blessing that he could die quickly. I feel, I cannot die quickly enough, when it is time for me to go!
So thank you very much for your kind thoughts, dear Joe.
I wish you and yours all the Best for the Holiday Season! I bet, Irene is at it to provide some excellent Christmas food! 🙂 You’re so lucky to have her, Joe! Give her my love! 🥰
Your friend Uta 🥰
Dear Uta – we have corresponded for a number of years – all without actually knowing each other. Over that time, each of us has experienced cycles of disappointment and depression … but this is the first time I am aware of you expressing it at this deep a level. I do not have any background in mental health so am unable to advise you as to whether some counseling might be advisable. That said, I do know from personal experience that there are circumstances where it can be helpful.
You have been through quite a bit and it is understandably difficult to find oneself alone after having shared so many years with a close companion. Additionally, as we become older, many of our longtime friends and relations reach the end of their years and no longer are with us. We are left nostalgically recalling the good times shared but must now increasingly face our days alone.
Along with age come physical limitations constraining and increasing the difficulty in all we choose to do.
The holiday season can be especially difficult as there is a general expectation of it being the most joyful time of the year. A time traditionally spent in festivities with family and friends but which we now more frequently spend by ourselves.
All of us know that our path through life is never smooth. That in addition to there being clear warm sunny days, our path also includes many dark difficult passages. We also know that regardless of difficulty and the heavy burden we carry, if we continue, we eventually reach a point where our “deep fog” and “struggle”s become more acceptable.
The miles separating us prevent us from sharing a cup of tea but … please keep reaching out and stay in touch. Many of us are thinking about you.
Sorry, Lew, my answer to you jumped further down!
Aw, SweetUta…so many deep feelings, so many important questions.
What you have shared reminds me of exact things my mom shared with me after Dad died…and as she lived on. She lived to be 97 and aging was so difficult. 😦
At any age, we all have ups and downs in life…and in our emotions.
I wish for you to be able to take one day at a time. I wish you joy to be found in each and every day. I wish for those around you to lift you up, help, comfort, and listen.
Keep writing if you can, and want to….you are a good writer and so often what you share helps me…and I appreciate you. Selfishly, I hope you are around here for a lot longer.
Sharing our thoughts and feelings with a counselor, or even a friend, can be helpful. If you feel the need to do so, I wish for you to find a good someone to talk with.
Love and (((HUGS))) ❤️❤️❤️
Big HUGS to you, dearest Caroline! Right now I feel too exhausted to write much and I make many mistakes. I’ll come back to you after a good night’s rest. I love you very much. Thank you for all your caring, thank you very much!
❤😘😊🌺 Uta
Get a good rest.
Write when you feel able. No rush. No expectations. 🙂
Love you, too, Dear Friend! 🙂
(((HUGS)))❤️
First of all, dear Lew, I want to thank you very, very much for your very thoughtful comment to my rather depressive sounding blog. Deep down I know, that somehow there must be some light at the end of the tunnel! And for sure, the sun is always going to shine again! 🙂
I feel our family is totally blessed, that Peter and I were allowed in 1959 to settle in Australi with our two lovely babies! We did not have to struggle in Australia, because we were given a lot of help. People were unbelievably friendly to us! We had no trouble feeling at home in Australia, even though a lot of things were very different from what they were like in Germany. I can’t believe how comparatively well off I am here now in Australia. I have a lot of freason to feel very lucky indeed.
I’ve lived already a very long life, and I am grateful, that it was overall a very good life. I always asked myself, what is the right thing to do for me. I feel, I really did live for very, very long already. Why on earth should I want to live much longer?
Lew you say, many of you are thinking of me. And this is wonderful to know this. Maybe some people that are still alive after my death, might still be thinking a bit abut me when I am gone. I do think a lot about the departed that I have known. I surprise myself how much more comes up about the life of Peter to think about. Memories, memories, memories, especially when I reread the blogs that he has written over the years. For as long as I have the strength to write comments about the lives of all the dearly departed, I want to write about them in a more or less spontanous fashion. For that I need contenplation and as few rules as possible that interfere with the way I want to live. Lew, please tell me, when I can’t write anymore and also cannot talk in depth to anyone anymore, why should I want then to be kept alive with medical intervention of any kind? If I should be in severe pain before I die, I would be very grateful for some effective palliative care. But no life prolonging care, please, none at all!
Now that the holiday season is past, I — and the others who responded to your posting — remain concerned and would like to know how you are now feeling. Hopefully you once again realize and appreciate what you mean to the rest of us.
So far, Lew, life is really good for me. I feel very healthy, also very independent. I guess, I’m just lucky. More and more I feel, I am able to stay independent! I love my life. and I pray a lot, that for as long as I live, I can stay independent. So I have great hope now, that my independence is not under threat.
Our independent TV station is showing a program right now, how people can be helped to remain independent for as long as possible, and that some risk taking on the part of the elderly to stay independent is better than getting help with everything, for this only increases the dependence of the elderly. People should not do things for the elderly, that they can still do themselves!
Dear Uta, I am so sorry for your pain. Depression is a symptom, not a sickness in itself, like fever – it comes and goes, and when we have moments like what you describe here, it can be overwhelming. I pray that this feeling of uselessness will pass and you will raise your eyes to look above the clouds at the beautiful blue of the sky. But I understand what you are saying, and am only a few years behind you, very aware of what may lie aead. Perhaps Christmastide brings this home to us. I can only say that expressing your feelings in some creative way, as you have here, may be helpful. You need to get them out into the light. Your life is not useless or purposeless, and you are dearly loved.
Maybe you will like this https://sundrytimes2.wordpress.com/2022/12/20/frankincenses-monster/
Abram’s book is called “Strength of Hope”.
In hospital soon after Christnas last year I was given very, very strong pain killers on a regular basis! They never let me sleep enough, no visitors were allowed, and finally they did not let me have any phone connection either. I was supposed to get some rehab to help me cope at home on my own. But only once was there some physio available for me. She made me do excessive exercises which made me faint because of extremely low blood pressure! Finally I said I wanted to discharge myself. I had money for a taxi to take me home. But they made me wait till the next day to prepare discharge papers, and then they called my daughter to take me home.
The terrible pain was caused by an extremely severe outbreak of Edema while I was staying with my son in Benalla, Victoria. There was horrible fluid built up in all my limbs and even on my head! My right arm was in a very compact plaster cast up to my elbow! this very tight cast was killing me with all that painful swelling inside. Weeks later, it turned out, the plaster had not been needed anymore at all, for the tiny fracture on my wrist had long ago already completely healed!
Finally, I found out now, that my hope for a reunion was totally misplaced. So, what gave me some strength for the whole past year, is no more. At my age I can forget about hoping for some kind of independent social life with old friends of the opposite sex. So this is not supposed to be for me, no not at all. I do know this now. I learned it the hard way, after living for so long in false hope.
So far, I can at least still look after myself at home. But of course I have to do everything extremely slowly. Also, I have very good neighbours and a few longtime very old women friends. Yes, and many people, especially my family, show me constantly that they love me very much. I can look hopefully into the future, whatever future there still is for me. I can’t always be sad, can I?
Suffering a lot of immobility problems, and not being able to drive a car does make life somewhat difficult for me, for I like to be as independent as possible.
Yes, Cat, thank you very much for your insightful blog and this beautiful video. It calmed me a lot.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-09-28/abram-goldberg-jewish-holocaust-survivor-strength-of-hope/101428346
Please, Cat, can you let me know what sort of an affect the above story has on you?
This story can easily bring me to tears, but it is really remarkable how this survivor feels and thinks!
Here is some of what this 97-year-old has to say:
“I am lucky. My mind is not too bad … I don’t know how long I am going to live, but as long as I live, I’ll do [everything] I’m capable of.”
Part of that work is trying to teach two lessons to everyone he speaks with.
“[Firstly] when wrong is done, [never] be a bystander,” he says.
And the other?
“There is only one race, the human race.
“No [matter] the colour of our skin, the shape of our eyes, the colour of our hair — what hurts one human being hurts also another.”
Despite all he’s suffered, Abram is infectiously positive about everything he’s achieved so far.
Dear Cat,
people like Abram Goldberg give me hope for the human race. We can learn so much from people like him.
Unfortunately, some people are always out to hate people that are different.
As far as I’m concerned, I can only live my life, the way I think is right for me.
That some kind of racial discrimination is still being played out by people who have a certain power, and also by a lot of ordinary people who were raised in the belief that for instance the white race is superior to any other race, well this is ignorance, because these people were probably not getting the right kind education to make them think for themselves!
When I feel, some wrong is being done to another human being, I always want to take the side of that person who has been wronged. However, what if I put anyone else in danger? I mean if I have to suffer in concentration camp, I’m prepared to suffer, but it can be a different ball game in times of war for instance, where speaking up for that wronged person, won’t help that person at all, but might bring the livelihood of whole families in danger.
It is so dehumanising, when you have to live under a dictatorship or a corrupt democracy, with no guranteed human rights. Maybe some dictatorships can be benovolent, it all depends. Is it perhaps often a power game of the elite?
Yes, Uta, these stories are incredibly moving. I have met some Holocaust (and Auschwitz) survivors, too. There is a huge range of emotions and responses to their experiences, people like Abram and Viktor frankly, and others who are dreadfully bitter. I have often wondered how I would react in such situations. Having also had to do with efugees from many different countries in the past decades, I have also heard some horror stories that have made me weep. I can only say, “Forgive us, Lord, – we know not what we do.”
Dear, dear Aunty Uta. You have indeed persevered through many trials in your long life. You have done so with admirable spirit and courage. But I do believe that the hardest hurdle is prolonged old age. It is so easy to become isolated. Friends, family, loved ones have passed on, leaving you to carry the torch by yourself. That is difficult. I can understand, I think, how you feel, despite how hard you try to keep your spirits up.
I do wonder, though, if perhaps one of your medications or a couple of them fighting with each other might be contributing to the darkness that you’re trying so valiantly to stave off? I’m not suggesting anti-depressants, but I do encourage you to talk with your doctor(s) to see if there could be a pharmacological reason for this added burden. Just getting old and losing so many bodily functions (to say nothing of friends) is hard enough. You don’t need the added burden of depression on top of it all.
Big, virtual hug to you.
Thank you, Linda, thank you very much!
I wish you all the best for a HAPPY NEW YEAR!
HUGS, your friend Uta 🥰
So, I’m thinking how I’m still useful towards the end of my life.
Also, I can still enjoy my life, very much so! And I can still stay fairly
independent, for instance by sizing down. The plan is, that I give up
my home and keep only one small room which is to be wholly just for me.
Today, I’ll write about this plan a bit more in a new post! 🙂
Reblogged this on AuntyUta and commented:
How useful is my life right now, only one month after I contemplated my ‘useless life’?