The Dementia Diaries

Odds of Survival

There is not much history of dementia in my family, to the best of my knowledge. It’s possible that’s because many of the likely candidates didn’t live long enough. Mom died at 56, the old man at 73. There was one aunt or uncle (I forget which, of course) who may have had a touch of Alzheimer’s. At least one of my aunts lived to be 88 with faculties intact. My older brother is likewise cognitively sharp in his early 80s. So, what, me worry? Well, sure. I’d rather get hit by a bus. Of course, when you think about it, bus-ification is probably preferable to a lot of other outcomes.

Death was the cheery topic of a conversation I had recently with a couple of guys on the tennis court. Both are in their (mid to late-ish) 80s, and both still whip me at tennis. Actuarily speaking, those guys have beat the odds. As one of them put it, he is well past his “sell-by date.” The average lifespan for a White male in the U.S. is 74.8, which, I’m happy to report, is in my rear-view mirror as well. Perhaps not surprisingly, the longer you live, the longer you’re expected to live. If you are a 50-year-old USWM today, you’re expected to live to 82. If (like me) you are 76, you’re expected to live to 88. And if, like my buddies, you are in your mid-80s, you still get another six or seven years. A tip of the hat to the Social Security Administration – or what remains of it – for all that useful information.

Not that I’m making book on another 12 years on this planet. In the words of Helmuth von Moltke, “No plan survives first contact with the enemy.” I smoked heavily until I was 40, and still have a sip of distilled spirits, pretty much daily. Choices, choices.

One of the driving forces behind this discussion is born of a recent discovery of mine, courtesy the Internet. As those of you who are divorced may know, one of the things you divvy up in the dissolution is who gets which friends. My ex-wife (of 40+ years ago) kept a couple with whom we would regularly carouse. It only made sense – she had the house in the town where they all lived, I split for the coast. Anyway, it dawned on me recently to check on them, an idle curiosity. He was a couple of years older than me, she older than him. They’re both gone now, I was sorry to learn, both within the bounds of what you might actuarily expect.

So. We’ll revisit these matters from time to time: life and death and cognitive health. Partly because the death of democracy is both infuriating and depressing, and I’m tired of talking about it. Partly because cognition interests me, and I’m curious to sort out the normal decline of age – forgetting names, trying to remember why you came into this room, increasing dependance on lists and calendars – from the more serious matters, like forgetting who those family members are when they are sitting next to you. Steve Martin, in a recent TV special, tells a story about his 91-year-old mother inquiring as to the whereabouts of her husband. “He died three years ago,” Steve tells her. “Well,” she replied, “That explains a lot.” Indeed, it does.