How are you doing? How do you feel today? Have you smiled yet today? Have you done something you enjoy doing? Or, would you even dare say that you have a little bounce in your step? Maybe it’s a good day for you. Then again, maybe it’s not. Maybe it’s a down day. A wayyyyy less-than-good day.
Do you ever do something that makes you feel young again…or at least younger than you actually are? You know, sometimes – especially these days with so much going on in the world – it’s enough to make us weary. Just exhausted and downhearted and spent. And… well…sometimes we just feel old.
Before our first grandson was born five years ago, I struggled to get up out of a chair. My knees were painful. They would hardly move. And once I was up, those first steps were so stiff. Getting up from sitting on the floor – well, that was a real chore.
But then our grandson came along and when his mom went back to work, he started coming to our house once a week from eight in the morning ‘til five o’clock in the evening. We played... and we played. On the floor. At first, I’d hold onto the coffee table to get myself up, then I'd reach down to pick him up. But as time went by, it got easier. I could get up off the floor as I held him and I realized that by taking care of a baby, I was beginning to feel younger. No, it wasn’t anything close to feeling 26 again (my age when I had my first baby) but it was better than I’d felt in a long time.
Now, I well know that my arthritis is not the same as your COPD. My mild discomfort doesn’t come close to the battle you wage every day. But let’s talk a little bit about what makes you feel young, or at least younger than you actually are, or younger than you’ve felt in the past. Maybe it’s a hobby, reading a certain book, listening to a particular kind of music, spending time with someone special, exercising, or something else.
No matter how old we are, or whatever physical challenge we may be facing, we can all stand to feel younger from time to time. What does it for you?