Mind Management And Super Aging

Stagnation and decay VS health and happiness

“Equip yourself with basic knowledge, manage your thoughts, and watch how it transforms your golden years into a golden opportunity.”

— Annelie H. Pelaez, RN

Seven blue-clad Matryoshka dolls line a wooden surface in descending size, with one tipped sideways to reveal its base.

Photo taken by Annelie.

Baffled and confused, I tended to patients in the intensive care unit (ICU) of my community hospital. Something was so wrong. I worked as a nurse taking care of patients who were admitted and readmitted for the same problems. Problems related to noncompliance of diabetes, heart disease, respiratory, and other chronic conditions were abundant.

Despite patient teachings and specific discharge instructions, many of the same patients repeatedly showed up in my assigned beds. Overdosing on sugar, not taking medications as ordered, eating sodium-laden processed food, and continuing to smoke sent patients back to the hospital.

“Why don’t they get it?” I wondered with genuine concern.

These patients were someone’s family member and friend; they were like you and me. It was painful to watch how their lives were unnecessarily interrupted and messed up. The patients’ end results were suffering, disability, and often death.

Then I got it.

It was not their fault. They did not fully know what they were doing.

The patients did not want this. They did not want to have their legs amputated. They did not want to have a stroke. They did not want to die from a heart attack. And they certainly did not want to be hooked up to a respirator with compromised lungs.

From no fault of their own, they were unable to understand and use health information. Despite well-meant and specific patient guidance from their health care providers, they lacked adequate personal health literacy skills.

According to the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the definition for personal health literacy is the degree to which individuals have the ability to find, understand, and use information and services to inform health-related decisions and actions for themselves and others.

Health literacy among the general population is low. But in our 65+ population, it is even lower. Only 3 out of 100 people over 65 have proficient health literacy skills. This article confirms that only 3% in my age group are good to go.

On paper, managing our own health with enough health literacy may sound easy. How hard can it be to take medications as ordered, keep appointments, eat broccoli, get a flu shot, walk for 30 minutes a day, and go for regular physicals?

But it is not easy.

Lack of health insurance and lack of transportation to a health care facility play a role. Challenges like hearing and vision loss are contributing factors. Since the internet came into play, reading and understanding medical and health instructions are often more complicated than they used to be.

“Take an aspirin and call me in the morning”, does not suffice anymore. Advanced technology may help or hinder, depending on how comfortable boomers and their older sisters and brothers are behind the computer screen.

An apple a day keeps the doctor away

That may help, but as we grow older, the apple is easy to forget. With dementia on the rise, cognitive decline is another stick in the health literacy wheel. This does not help the general aging stereotyping.

Between widespread ageism and negative age beliefs, there is a lot of shame. Shame for not fully understanding the information and shame from fear of looking stupid by speaking up and saying,” Sorry, I didn’t quite get that.”

We cannot blame people for not understanding information that has not been made perfectly clear. How can they use spoken or written information to support and advance their own health when they do not understand the rationale behind the information provided by health care professionals?

Rationale is when health care providers explain the reasoning behind the actions that patients are recommended to take. It is all about the WHY. When the why is missing, the power behind a behavior change loses its significance.

When a patient understands and believes that significance, and wants to comply to improve the outcome, they can do anything. They can move mountains with the provided information and build on it. But better communication between the patient and the health care provider is needed for this to happen.

Communication, allowing patients to exercise the right to information they can understand, may be improved with Motivational Interviewing (MI). The MI technique is used by health care professionals; doctors, nurses, social workers, dietitians, and other therapists to improve patient communication.

The dialogue with the patient guides them in making their own choices to improve their own health. This includes behavioral changes as they relate to medication adherence, weight loss, smoking cessation, exercise and specific needs pertaining to the patient.

It helps them to make positive behavior changes because it allows them to resolve ambivalence and strengthen their own motivation for change. This creates a therapeutic mindset; the patient is in the driver’s seat.

Rather than a victim mindset, when the patient feels overwhelmed with several behaviors that need change, MI helps them to feel a sense of control in a supportive and non-judgmental environment.

But unfortunately, more often than not, this is not so.

Most adults over 65 cannot properly manage their own health.

The shocking result of this is that nearly 93% of adults over age 65 have one chronic disease or more. Chronic diseases include diabetes, high blood pressure, heart disease, and obesity. This information from the National Council on Aging (NCO) is a wake-up call.

My Mom was included in these statistics. I remember how she was told to stop smoking on her annual physical, year after year. She was also told to lose weight, lower her blood pressure, lower her cholesterol, and exercise.

She tried to comply, but it was not enough. Feeling overwhelmed by all these lifestyle changes, her attempts at behavioral changes were short-lived. Needless to say, as she grew older, her health deteriorated.

Had she known basic health literacy, my Mom would know this:

1. She was a walking time-bomb, experiencing classic risk factors of cardiovascular diseases (CVDs), the leading cause of death in the world.
2. Risk factors that she had were evident by high blood pressure, high cholesterol, cigarette smoking, being overweight, and a sedentary lifestyle. Added risk factors for CVD are diabetes and excess alcohol use, which did not apply to my Mom. She did not drink, and she had no problems with her blood sugar.
3. CVDs are a group of disorders of the heart and the blood vessels. The blood vessels are diseased from the buildup of fats, cholesterol, calcium, and other substances. This buildup is called plaque. Plaque reduces the size of the lumen in the arteries so that it is harder for the blood to flow through the blood vessels and reach its destination.
4. Disease in the blood vessels, the inner lining of the arteries, leading to the heart, is called coronary heart disease. Disease of the blood vessels leading to the brain is called cerebrovascular disease. Disease of the blood vessels leading to the arms and legs is called peripheral arterial disease.
5. The blood flow delivers nutrients and oxygen to vital organs. When the blood vessels are occluded, the blood cannot pass through. When blocked, nutrients and oxygen cannot reach their target destination. Legs, heart, or brain; tissue and part of the organ decay or die.
6. Most CVDs can be prevented or managed with behavioral and environmental changes. This can prevent suffering and premature death. It can prevent broken families and generational loss.

Then it happened.

At age 64, my mom suffered a debilitating stroke. She lost the function of the right side of her body and her speech. She also lost her life as she knew it. So did we, her children and present and future grandchildren. My precious, beautiful, and talented Mom did not just lose her dreams about future goals, but she also lost her present ability to sew, knit, and crochet.

It did not have to be this way. 80% of strokes are preventable, according to the American Heart Association (AHA). That translates into 80 out of 100 people can avert a stroke with healthy lifestyle changes and sufficient health literacy skills.

If we know this to be true, why do so many of our 65+ population suffer and die from preventable chronic diseases? There are multiple answers to this. One answer is that we need better mind management.

The Power of Mind Management with Conscious Thought Selection

“What we think determines what happens to us, so if we want to change our lives, we need to stretch our minds.” — Wayne Dyer

Call it mindfulness, meditation, focus, or awareness. Mind management is our super tool for aging with health and success. Intentional health and success start in our head, not in the body.

I finally figured this out. Going beyond our mental turbulence and connecting to our true selves has a profound effect on how we view ourselves and our health. I started studying the history and practice of meditation. Sage Patanjali and great masters from the ancient Yoga traditions became my teachers. Later, in 2010, I became certified so that I could better help myself and my patients.

At age 75, I still renew my meditation certification every two years. I have learned that with continued practice, conscious mind management helps us to grow in the direction of our dreams.

I have also learned that by moving inward, practicing systemic relaxation and breath awareness, we learn to focus. We practice focused awareness. With a conscious mind, we relax and release stress from tense body parts before we move on to meditation.

This practice trains the mind to stay where we want it to stay.

Because the mind likes to do its own thing and run away, we train it to stay put. When letting go of disturbing thoughts and mind clutter, we leave room for new thoughts. These are thoughts that we consciously choose. Thoughts that serve us, thoughts that help us grow, and thoughts that produce health, happiness, and personal success.

We learn to bring awareness to what matters

Because most of our daily behaviors are automatic, rising from the subconscious mind, we are not truly in charge of our own behaviors. When working to change deep-seated behaviors — smoking, eating patterns, activity levels, and health attitudes — we need conscious practice and effort.

Only with conscious thought selection can we build a life that is dominated by health and success. First, we must become clear on what we want. Who we want to be, what we want to do, and what we want to have. In addition, we must know the big, fat WHY. Why we want what we want and why it matters. Regardless of what we want, the critical ingredient is always health literacy.

What matters is health literacy.

When not depending on poor subconscious habits, we can kick stagnation and decay to the moon. With better mind management, we can give our older selves what we deserve; golden opportunities, lined with better health and more happiness.

I wish my beloved Mom knew this.

Click this link to enjoy a free, short, guided meditation practice.

Thank you ♥️

. . .

🇳🇴Annelie Holmene Pelaez believes that everyone has an attribute to share with others. Promoting cardiovascular health and helping adults over age 65 is her contribution. When we don’t let age define us, but rather empower us to grow, we discover health and happiness are byproducts of who we are.

Annelie is the author of the book, Say Yes to A Better Life, available at Amazon.

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