Itineraries Spring 2005 | Partnerships In Aging

Contents:

Terry Schiavo’s Legacy For Us by Martha L. Henderson, MSN, DMin.

Terry Schiavo’s Legacy For Us by Martha L. Henderson, MSN, D.Min.

The author, Martha L. Henderson, MSN, DMin, is a retired faculty member of the University of North Carolina Schools of Nursing and Medicine and the UNC Program on Aging. She is a geriatric nurse practitioner and ordained minister. In her forthcoming book, The Gift of Life: Living Your Journey to the Fullest, Henderson invites us to live “in the light of death, and not in its shadow.”

How tragic that Terri Schiavo never discussed her wishes about end-of-life treatment with all her loved ones and completed advance directives.” “I would never want to live like that.” “I still haven’t completed my advance directives.” “Who should I choose to speak for me who really understands my values and wishes and will stand up for me?”

I encourage you to engage in a thoughtful process called advance care planning (ACP) or preparing for the end of your life. It will enable you to prepare for a “good death,” one that is as comfortable as possible and determined by your values and wishes.

It will also spare your loved ones from having to make difficult decisions for you.

First, take some quiet time to think about your own death. What comes up for you? This time of pondering may evoke fears of pain or discomfort at the end. It may bring up unfinished business, such as unresolved relationships or questions about your relationship with God or your inner source of strength. It may bring questions about your current priorities in life and some things you want to do before your die. The hardest part of this contemplation is to realize that death can come at any time without warning.

Secondly, take your own health seriously. How much do you know about and take responsibility for your own health, chronic illnesses, such as hypertension, and death predictors based on your lifestyle (being overweight or sedentary, smoking, chronic stress), your family history (heart disease, high cholesterol, diabetes, dementia)? Make an appointment to see your primary provider, not only for a check-up, but also to discuss your life expectancy based on your risk factors, and what treatment issues will probably arise for you in the future. Ask if your practitioner will advocate for you in getting your wishes honored and providing comfort care, including referring you to hospice.

Thirdly, take some time to think about what you want when your time to die comes, in terms of imagining your ideal death. Think not only about what you do not want (a ventilator or a feeding tube perhaps), but also about what you do want, such as being at home with loved ones around. What comfort measures do you want, such as having your pet close by, or getting healing touch as your favorite music plays, or having someone reading sacred writings?

There are some tools and resources to help you with the details of this process and the decisions that need to be made. The University of North Carolina Program on Aging created an interactive, educational website to guide health care students and professionals as well as consumers through the advance care planning process. Among the resources, you can find printable advance directive forms (for North Carolina), the living will and Health Care Power of Attorney (HCPOA) as well as a helpful Advance Care Planning Worksheet you can attach to your forms. The learning module includes a discussion of various treatment options, choosing the best health care power of attorney, and suggestions for structuring a family meeting. In North Carolina, you may also obtain and register your advance directives on line at with the Secretary of State. Five Wishes, another popular tool, is available for purchase. Project Compassion is a local area resource for helping individuals and their families with end of life issues. See

Fourthly, talk with your family about your wishes. Hear their reactions and invite them to share their own thoughts about their deaths. This can be a challenging and helpful opportunity to resolve any family conflict about carrying out your decisions, so that your death can be peaceful and they will be left with good memories.

Fifthly, print out advance directive forms or obtain them from your local hospital. Complete them and take them to your bank for signing, witnessing, and notarization. Immediately make copies of ADs and other documents and distribute them to your agent (HCPOA), your loved ones, your primary provider, and your hospital medical records department.

There are two important details: Your advance directives must be translated into medical orders to direct your care. This means a physician or authorized nurse practitioner must write orders, such as Do Not Resuscitate (DNR), Do not tube feed, Do not hospitalize, etc., if and when you become terminally ill or in a persistent vegetative state. You also need an accompanying portable yellow DNR order, available through your primary provider or hospital, if you are transported anywhere.

The final step in the advance care planning process is leaving your legacy. Legacies may include completing an organ and tissue donor form available on the Secretary of State website, or leaving money to a favorite cause or educational institution. It may be writing about your childhood or selecting special personal mementos to give to loved ones now. The best legacy may be to be a role model of living your life to the fullest, recognizing how precious life is and bringing joy to others and yourself.

Love in Later Life by Bolton Anthony

Last June I sent a small group of friends an email I described as “one of the strangest I’ve ever written.” Noting that the coming October would mark 10 years since I had separated from my first wife, I wrote that while “living alone has been good and necessary… I really don’t want to do this the rest of my life and should look for a companion… Since one of the best ways to meet new friends and possible partners is ‘referrals’ from old friends, I’m writing to tell you — and the universe — that I’m open to new possibilities.”

I was poised to hit the SEND button, when the inbox suddenly logged INCOMING mail. That’s interesting, I thought. The new email was from American Singles, an online dating service that I had registered with some ten months earlier. Registering is different from becoming a member; membership costs money. Just registering, however, gets you a weekly batch of “profiles.” But the eight women whose profiles would arrive each week proved so uniformly uninteresting or inappropriate — I could specify age (50-64) but not spiritual sensibilities, distance from Chapel Hill (a 50-mile radius) but not political affiliations — that there were weeks when I simply deleted the unopened email. The new email was different. There among an otherwise undistinguished group was Lisa (a.k.a. “Catwoman”):

Aphrodite in search of Adonis

“I look 50, feel 40, and am an active person with a young and playful spirit and a good sense of humor who likes to laugh and have fun! I love my friends and am a good friend; I’m warm, affectionate and giving, and enjoy spontaneity and adventure. I love movies (old and new), the beach, nature, walking my dog, cooking, reading, theater, music, and trying out new things. I work part-time in the health care field and help people lead happier lives. I’m more spiritual than religious. I stay healthy with exercise and yoga and like to dance. I also volunteer at the homeless shelter.”

I wrote Lisa: “I was writing the email I’ve inserted below and simultaneously got something from American Singles in which your picture jumped out. I don’t ignore such synchronicity and have spent $25 to become a ‘premium member’ and write you. Would you like to meet for coffee?”

It took six weeks for her to get my email and respond: her American Singles membership had lapsed months earlier and she had to “re-up.” It took another two weeks for us to have that cup of coffee, because I was in Oakland — testing the waters for what is now the upcoming August 4-7 Visioning Council at Santa Sabina — when I got Lisa’s email. It took a second date for us to fall in love and another seven months for us to set a date for our wedding.

Southerner that I am, I’m a bit uncomfortable sharing this intimate story. I do it for a reason.

In last June’s email to my friends I wrote, “The likely truth is I could not have done the work I have done if I’d had a partner. It was too intense.” When you are single, your work can be your life — as Second Journey has been mine since I founded it in December of 1999. Once you open the door to a relationship, however, you must strike a better balance between work… and LIFE. My conversation a year ago with Reb Zalman is pertinent. I had just turned 60; he was approaching 80 and intending to “retire.” I knew he had begun his work with “Sage-ing” when he was 60, and I expressed the hope that I also would have 20 years to complete my work. He told me, “I will give you a blessing — a blessing which carries all the good will of all the ancestors who have made me who I am. May you complete your work in 10 years and have 10 years to enjoy it!”
As I wrote last October:

A number of people have thanked me for “holding the space.” It’s as if I’d arrived early for the picnic, staked out a lush spot by the river and put dibs on the place by scattering blankets and chairs all about. I do not have THE VISION; no one person does. It is scattered in pieces among us, and we will find our way into the future only by coming together in community and delighting in the different treats we each bring to the celebration.

So it is for you I have been holding this place. What would you like to bring to our potluck? What are your thoughts about where Second Journey should go, and what role do you wish to play, what contribution do you wish to make? What kind of organization or container do we need to create TOGETHER, to hold and direct this energy?

Yes, I have been holding this wonderful space beside the river for YOU! It’s now time for you to take your place there, time for Lisa and me to welcome greater spaciousness into our lives, and time for all of us to enjoy life.

We live the given life, not the planned.

— Wendell Berry

News and Notices

Opinion by Bolton Anthony

Congress “cut a great road through the law” to get at what some of its members perceived as the Devil: a “culture of death” in opposition to a “culture of life.” Below are the reflections of Thomas More in Robert Bolt’s play, A Man for All Seasons, on what comes of such zealotry.

Thomas More (to his son-in-law): What would you do, son Roper? Cut a great road through the law to get at the devil?

Roper: Yes! I’d cut down every law in England to do that.

More: Oh? And when the last law was down and the devil turned ’round on you, where would you hide…the laws all being flat? This country is planted thick with laws coast to coast, man’s laws, not God’s, and if you cut them down, …do you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then? Yes, I would give the devil the benefit of law for my own safety.

New Book — Finding Our Way: Leadership for an Uncertain Time by Margaret Wheatley
Berrett-Koehler Publishers, 2005

Meg Wheatley writes, teaches and speaks about radically new practices and ideas for organizing in chaotic times. She has worked in virtually every type of organization and on all continents (except Antarctica), and has been a dedicated global citizen since her youth. She has been an organizational consultant and researcher since 1973, a professor of management in two graduate programs, and serves as president of The Berkana Institute, a global charitable leadership foundation. She is the author of three other books: the pathbreaking bestseller, Leadership and the New Science; and Turning to One Another: Simple Conversations to Restore Hope to the Future; and A Simpler Way (with Myron Kellner-Rogers).

Provocative, challenging, poetic, and often deeply moving, Finding Our Way sums up Wheatley’s thinking on a diverse scope of topics, from leadership and management, to social change, to our personal role in these turbulent times; from provocative social commentary to specific organizational practices and more.

ElderSpirit Cohousing Community Breaks Ground in Abingdon, Virginia

ElderSpirit is the first elder cohousing community. A mixed income development that defines itself as “a community of mutual support and late life spirituality,” it has received national publicity (see the recent article, “Communes for Grown-ups,” by Ben Brown in the AARP Bulletin) as it blazed new trails. Construction is expected to be completed by July. Twelve homes for purchase and 14 rental units have been reserved, leaving only one home and two rental units unspoken for.

Taking Second Journey’s Visioning Council To Germany

The Korber-Stiftung Foundation, which is based in Germany, sponsors an annual “Transatlantic Idea Contest” whose aim is to identify U.S. projects which are good candidates for implementation in Germany. This year’s contest focuses on “Transitions in Life,” and from a reading of the contest guidelines Second Journey’s Visioning Council initiative seems a good fit.

Three proposals will be selected to receive funding for implementation in Germany:

Project Prizes —Up to three convincing concepts will be awarded an additional Project Prize worth 10,000 Euro. This Prize is bound to the respective project – which means it is to be used for the implementation of your idea. If the project develops favorably, it might be eligible for additional support.

We would like to find 2 or 3 people interested in developing a proposal to conduct a Visioning Council in Germany. Since “the contest is open to all who are familiar with both Germany and the United States,” obviously one team member needs to know something about Germany! The deadline for submission is October 31, 2005; decisions are to be made in March 2006.