Last week, I had surgery on my left knee. Nothing too serious — it was an arthroscopic clean-out of a torn meniscus from several years ago. Even though I had a great team, and one of the best knee scope surgeons in the world, let’s be real: surgery is freaky. Bad things happen, my knee may never be the same, there could be complications, I could never wake up from the anesthesia…all this was on my mind. Surgery is a weirdly powerless situation; just give up all control and let’s hope my 64-year-old body will be ok, and I maybe can get several more decades out of it. But suppose it didn’t go well? Catastrophic thinking is magnetic.
I have always been in some denial of my age; age dysmorphia perhaps. I am not so deluded that I don’t see the changes in my skin, my declined physical capacity, and even the occasional inability to recall a name. All this bothers me even though comparatively I am doing great. The issue is that the trend curve of capacity is not going in the happy direction. My knee procedure is probably one of many future medical interventions to keep me going. My gym metrics and blood work could be in the top 10% of 35-year-olds, which is a nice brag, but not much of a barrier against the age-related decline slowly eroding my biology. I was late bloomer, and so have this idea that I need an especially long runway.
In the beginning of AGEIST, as we were doing our thousands of hours of interviews, we quickly saw that mortality and decline were a huge part of the landscape. This week, for one of the first times, I really felt it. Being a practiced denialist, my response of course is to cause myself to recover surprisingly quickly, if for no other reason than I can tell myself, “I am still here, and can still rock.” But what would all of you think of me if perhaps my knee no longer behaved? Would I be judged less-than if the surgery outcome was not so great? How would having a bad knee affect how I saw myself?
Nothing stays the same; at any given moment new cells are being born, as others are removed. We are in a constant state of change whether we acknowledge it or not. Our body is not a static thing; it changes all the time. Adaptation is equally endless. If we focus on trying to be the best we can be today, with the bodies and circumstances we are given, then that sounds like a win. Even if my knee totally failed, I know I can still be useful, which is what gets me out of bed every day excited for what I may be able to contribute.
Onward and upward,
David
