I won’t do medicare. I turned sixty last month. I have not had a checkup since I was 44, and then only to get life insurance. By the time anyone finds cancer in me it will be because it’s taken this body over.
I’ve self diagnosed myself better than a doctor when I got gout (he thought it was a broken big toe). And it took me five minutes on the internet to find out what I had, and another five to find out that Black Cherry juice would fix it. It did.
I have little respect for the “organized” medical community. There are many people in it that definitely mean well, but then, there were many soldiers in Hitler’s army that sincerely believed God was on their side. It is a serious cash cow. It makes more money treating people than curing people, broken bones, etc. notwithstanding. I choose not to participate except for stuff that I pay for out of pocket.
And we are huge on preventative stuff. I’ve not had a big mac since 1996 and we use a masticating juicer for most of our meals (and supply it from a half acre garden). When in Seattle I rode every Seattle To Portland bike ride from 1991 to 2006, quitting only because I got bored with the ride, but I continued bike commuting until texting drivers made it too dangerous.
Now I getmy exercise trapsing around my hilly 32 acres cutting up trees, digging ditches and fence post holes and cleaning culverts on my creeks.
Life is a mist. I see it as a video game. I’m having a blast at every phase. And like a video game, it has multiple lives, at least for me. I had my “life as a minor”, followed by my life as a husband and father, followed by my “bicycling and fitness years” followed by my musician years. It is almost like re-incarnation except I remember each previous life and occupy the same body.
It’s really a LOT of fun.
In that is another facet. I went from intellectual agnostic to Christian to Christian teacher in my churches and wherever I meet people. That is the most important part of this “video game” we call life. Then it’s “game over” and I go to be with the Lord. That is when things REALLY take off. :-)
I think one of the biggest life changing events for me was getting rid of TV in 1997. It certainly freed up a lot of my time...
A few years ago, my doctor recommended against gamma knife radiation for the residue of a benign pituitary tumor that was left in my head left after surgery. I am grateful for that advice, which was not only well-supported in the medical literature, but came almost a year before major problems with the gamma knife radiation machine were revealed. Due to my doctor's advice, I was spared what could have been an excessive and unnecessary dose of gamma radiation.