New and experienced climbers over 50 #38

Permabeta wrote:

Agree with much of what you've said about modern medicine, Lori. But short of blowing up the entire insurance/medical/hospital/pharma industrial complex, I don't know how to shift to the "glass half full" approach, to emphasize healthful habits, rather than diagnose and treat disease. I mean, somebody needs to do the latter, too. Maybe team up health/life coaches with healthcare providers during non-urgent medical visits? Functional medicine looks good on the surface, but usually distills to overtesting, unsubstantiated supplements, and other dubious interventions.

And although I intrinsically dislike/distrust the podcast format, I have listened to Van Loon, after you linked him in one of our prior interactions. He seems legit. Importantly, he isn't advocating sky-high protein intake (anything over 1.6 mg/kg/day) like many of the other pop nutrition "gurus".   

Agreed. I don’t personally have the energy anymore to try to change the world. I just want to veer the course a bit with my own behavior. If I can gently remind my physicians to look a little deeper, I do. I spent 40 years in the medical field and I know what they are up against. I try to maintain a spirit of gratitude and if I should get a snake bite or need my appendix removed I will thank them profusely for their care.

I was fortunate enough to train with a neurologist from Harvard who had a metanoya  of sorts and had a very different view of health and wellness. I got to sit in on some of his patient interviews, which were deeply compassionate, and attend many lectures.  No provider would have that kind of time today and that’s just the way it is.

But there are so many assumptions made with an aging population and I am asking my doctors to see me differently. Don’t assume that I will be feeble or that I am on a litany of medications. I have had two doctors who were shocked, quite literally, that I wore an insulin pump. They thought they had the wrong patient. When I asked them “how do your other diabetic patients manage their diabetes at this age?” I was told “they don’t“. They are dying.

In my business, I really liked the statement “set expectations”. I think it applies here as well. The Medical establishment as it stands right now is not going to focus on  bringing folks to glowing health.  With an average of 2400 patients per Dr. the best they can do is identify a disease process, prescribe a pill or surgery and get you out of there.  So I believe we are really on our own as older citizens to read and listen and try our best to sort through a lot of information out there and hope it pays off.  

John Gill wrote:

Alan:  the year was 1759, when Uncle Johnny's book, Gymnastik für die Jugend, came out.

Link to the book at internet archive.

Lori Milas wrote:

Agreed. I don’t personally have the energy anymore to try to change the world. I just want to veer the course a bit with my own behavior. If I can gently remind my physicians to look a little deeper, I do. I spent 40 years in the medical field and I know what they are up against. I try to maintain a spirit of gratitude and if I should get a snake bite or need my appendix removed I will thank them profusely for their care.

I was fortunate enough to train with a neurologist from Harvard who had a metanoya  of sorts and had a very different view of health and wellness. I got to sit in on some of his patient interviews, which were deeply compassionate, and attend many lectures.  No provider would have that kind of time today and that’s just the way it is.

But there are so many assumptions made with an aging population and I am asking my doctors to see me differently. Don’t assume that I will be feeble or that I am on a litany of medications. I have had two doctors who were shocked, quite literally, that I wore an insulin pump. They thought they had the wrong patient. When I asked them “how do your other diabetic patients manage their diabetes at this age?” I was told “they don’t“. They are dying.

In my business, I really liked the statement “set expectations”. I think it applies here as well. The Medical establishment as it stands right now is not going to focus on  bringing folks to glowing health.  With an average of 2400 patients per Dr. the best they can do is identify a disease process, prescribe a pill or surgery and get you out of there.  So I believe we are really on our own as older citizens to read and listen and try our best to sort through a lot of information out there and hope it pays off.  

Lori, this one's for you:

> I have had two doctors who were shocked, quite literally, that I wore an insulin pump. They thought they had the wrong patient. When I asked them “how do your other diabetic patients manage their diabetes at this age?” I was told “they don’t“. They are dying.

That sounds so strange. They don't manage their diabetes? Don't they die real quick that way?

Ward Smith wrote:

Good for you!  I haven’t been there since the 90’s, great mix of trad and sport.

There has been a lot of new route development since that time, both at the City and at Castle Rocks.  Might be worth considering a return visit.

dragons wrote:

Lori, this one's for you:

> I have had two doctors who were shocked, quite literally, that I wore an insulin pump. They thought they had the wrong patient. When I asked them “how do your other diabetic patients manage their diabetes at this age?” I was told “they don’t“. They are dying.

That sounds so strange. They don't manage their diabetes? Don't they die real quick that way?

Hey! A favorite band and a favorite song of mine. Thank you.  You’ll catch John’s attention too.  

With regards to insulin-dependent diabetes: it’s an extremely complicated disease to manage. Treatment options are to inject  4 to 10 injections daily with syringes and test your blood sugar hourly, or use a pump which has a lot of complex settings along with a continuous glucose monitor (two separate devices), and continue to adjust with meals, exercise and dozens of other activities . Among options for assessing control, testing hemoglobin A1c is one of the gold standards and can range from a 4.0 to 15 and higher. 4.5 is ideal for a non-diabetic, meaning an average blood glucose of around 80. Endocrinologists try to hold their patients around 7.0 which is still very high blood sugar. So my A1c is 5.6 which is almost non-diabetic.  Apparently most seniors opt for multiple injections, do not have pumps, do not test their blood sugar very often and have an A1c as high as 10 or 11.

I can’t blame them because this is hard. I do worry what will happen when I am too old or confused or clumsy to juggle all of this. One low blood sugar can mean death. Chronically high blood sugars result in blindness and amputations. It’s just not an option to screw this up.

So I guess it was these doctors experience that older people are just not able to do more than barely stay alive and also they did say they usually see their older patients mostly in the hospital.

Sorry if that’s TMI.

Funny, I paused on a long hike to crack open and read these posts – – this hike is my least favorite and it’s a long one and as I sit here opining about blood sugar I am having to watch mine every minute. If I got into any kind of trouble up here someone would have to carry me down.  It’s just not an option to screw it up!

Carl Schneider wrote:

I find I need a bit of rest between climbing days generally, although I do climb almost every day when I’m away on a trip. These days more than four days a week climbing and I don’t recover.  

I treat climbing as my daily exercise these days trying not to pull too hard. More overall body movement than trying to only get on difficult climbs. It’s the only form of exercise that combines social, aerobic and full body movement that I can stick with.  

Treadmills are boring, and I’m in Irvine, the flattest and most conservative part of California and Golf isn’t really exercising  

That hike looks cool, Lori!

I'm home now and have my computer - following up as promised to Wendy and other women about the info I recently read on GSM. A new guideline issued this year provides 26 recommendations for recognizing and managing genitourinary syndrome of menopause (GSM). Low-dose vaginal estrogen is highlighted as key treatment (even with woman on systemic HRT). The need for evidence-based guidance is reflected in the epidemiology surrounding GSM. Women spend about 40% of their lives post-menopause, during which as many as 84% of the patients report symptoms consistent with GSM. (Increased risk of UTI is a feature of GSM.) Here's a little blurb from the Instagram of an MD who is an expert in urology and sexual medicine.

Li Hu wrote:

I treat climbing as my daily exercise these days trying not to pull too hard. More overall body movement than trying to only get on difficult climbs. It’s the only form of exercise that combines social, aerobic and full body movement that I can stick with.  

Treadmills are boring, and I’m in Irvine, the flattest and most conservative part of California and Golf isn’t really exercising  

That hike looks cool, Lori!

Li Hu you’re back!  You sure do move around a lot! Running from the law?   

This is a wicked trail and I hate it. People are SO rude  just sashay on by with their lattes and flip flops while I suffer.  And there’s no place to pee.

I may go again tomorrow.   

meanwhile, I have devised a gym along my usual trail. There’s a beautiful rock for sit ups and crunches, I have a push-up wall, there’s a great place for hangs, and a good spot for chimneying.  All in all it’s a win-win- it won’t replace the Gravitron at the gym but it’s full body early morning sun and a good workout.

Li Hu wrote:

I treat climbing as my daily exercise these days trying not to pull too hard. More overall body movement than trying to only get on difficult climbs. It’s the only form of exercise that combines social, aerobic and full body movement that I can stick with.  

Treadmills are boring, and I’m in Irvine, the flattest and most conservative part of California and Golf isn’t really exercising  

That hike looks cool, Lori!

Ah....but it can be made really fun!

My friend and I found ourselves on a local mini golf course, when it was close to raining. We were the only ones there, the staff dude was also tasked with inside stuff.....

So we played. Hard. We had golf balls flying hard all over the place. If one of us got one airborn, the other tried to connect with it like a baseball (we never managed). My game became trying to get my ball to slam into my friend's and knock him off the course. 

We only got away with it once, but it was memorable!

We were out at the local bouldering area today, although not bouldering. I signed up with the Idaho Fish and Game department to be a voluntary field person, for a monarch butterfly monitoring project. Basically, it means "adopting" some patches of milkweed, then doing 3 surveys, at specified times. Today was the last visit. None of ours had any signs of monarchs, at any life stage, but at least it confirmed that those particular patches still existed, so it's baseline info. 

Basically, it was a nice hike, anyway.

We have signage that's pretty amusing, as it's on the Snake river, and adjacent to a dam. I think actual climbers could have an edge, here. Lori would do great, as the truly "higher ground" is across the 45 degree or steeper talus slopes, lol!

I like the huge tsunami event they picture!

Milkweed beetles, from visit 2, in July.

H.

Helen, was that Swan Falls?

We are passing through next week and plan to try to boulder there in the early morning, despite the high temps.

Lori Milas wrote:

Li Hu you’re back!  You sure do move around a lot! Running from the law?   

Thanks, yeah, they’re close but luckily always a step behind   

Mark E Dixon wrote:

Helen, was that Swan Falls?

We are passing through next week and plan to try to boulder there in the early morning, despite the high temps.

Yeah, Swan Falls! Get out early. It's doable in the heat, just not much fun. If you haven't been, it's a pretty huge boulder field, and you can kinda just do anything you want, on any boulder you want, so be open to just eyeballing stuff and deciding to give it a go....or not. You can find much that's easy, plus truly hard (this is where Matt Fultz grew up).Also walk around your boulder and make sure you have a way down that you're comfortable with. 

You'll likely be entirely alone, too, although there's almost always people fishing. 

Have fun!

Oh, and let me know if you wanna borrow a guidebook and/or some pads!

Helen

Idaho Bob wrote:

There has been a lot of new route development since that time, both at the City and at Castle Rocks.  Might be worth considering a return visit.

I haven't been since 2007 and at that time the castle rock section had just (re)opened, the city felt almost twice as big. The most amazing granite cragging around the west IMO. It would be really amazing to ski in on a sunny winter day and knock off a bunch of South faces with nobody around.

Did a kilter board session at 50 degrees today and for Rich I did two sets of three pullups with 40 pounds.  I am 10 pounds heavier than my ideal weight so there is hope for some improvement.

M M wrote:

I haven't been since 2007 and at that time the castle rock section had just (re)opened, the city felt almost twice as big. The most amazing granite cragging around the west IMO. It would be really amazing to ski in on a sunny winter day and knock off a bunch of South faces with nobody around.

There's now significantly more acreage to Castle, with the land acquisition! The new book includes these new* areas! 

* The asterisk being that lots was climbed way back....but it's now officially open to climbing. There's still stuff that got closed, that remains closed. BLM, and Twin Sisters, most notably. 

Oh, and one of my favorite trips involved no climbing at all. January! Literally the only ones in the entirety of COR that day!

City would be tough skiing, with it being uphill the whole way in. Castle could be quite doable, I'd guess, but that's based on nike riding there, I'm not a skier.

Old lady H wrote:

City would be tough skiing, with it being uphill the whole way in. Castle could be quite doable, I'd guess, but that's based on nike riding there, I'm not a skier.

Pomerelle right next door...

We've climbed in t-shirts in January at the City...

Uphill on the way in means downhill to the truck. 

Old lady H wrote:

There's now significantly more acreage to Castle, with the land acquisition! The new book includes these new* areas! 

* The asterisk being that lots was climbed way back....but it's now officially open to climbing. There's still stuff that got closed, that remains closed. BLM, and Twin Sisters, most notably. 

Oh, and one of my favorite trips involved no climbing at all. January! Literally the only ones in the entirety of COR that day!

City would be tough skiing, with it being uphill the whole way in. Castle could be quite doable, I'd guess, but that's based on nike riding there, I'm not a skier.

Many skiers love the uphill, 10 up and 10 down is a pretty average day on x-country skis. I'd probably bring the lightest rack and rope ever but 100% would sleep like a happy baby after that. No alarm clock of course.

Old lady H wrote:

Yeah, Swan Falls! Get out early. It's doable in the heat, just not much fun. If you haven't been, it's a pretty huge boulder field, and you can kinda just do anything you want, on any boulder you want, so be open to just eyeballing stuff and deciding to give it a go....or not. You can find much that's easy, plus truly hard (this is where Matt Fultz grew up).Also walk around your boulder and make sure you have a way down that you're comfortable with. 

You'll likely be entirely alone, too, although there's almost always people fishing. 

Have fun!

Oh, and let me know if you wanna borrow a guidebook and/or some pads!

Helen

Thanks! 

We've got the Epeldi guide and as many pads as we can carry. 

Just need a breeze and luck with the morning temps

M M wrote:

I haven't been since 2007 and at that time the castle rock section had just (re)opened, the city felt almost twice as big. The most amazing granite cragging around the west IMO. It would be really amazing to ski in on a sunny winter day and knock off a bunch of South faces with nobody around.

I'm guessing that you would need to be pretty lucky to get good skiing conditions in the City itself or Castle Rock. It isn't a high precipitation area in general ( well, more so in the upper reaches) and gets a lot of sun, even in winter, so much of the snow that does fall doesn't last long except in the shaded areas. I climbed there for a day once in late Feb./early March ( forget which). We did, indeed, climb in shirt sleeves on the sunny faces, but most of the approaches were over bare ground, but with pockets of very hard snow in the shadows---nothing worth skiing. But. as mentioned above, there is a ski area close by, futher up in the mountains.