Hw - 17 Initial Thoughts on Illness and Dying

My initial thought about illness and dying happen to be nothing at the moment because personally I don't know anyone personal who died or is ill. Experience is the best teacher, and I have no experience with both of these topics but I know that eventually everyone will suffer from one of these topics. So how do I cope with this then? I avoid it. I avoid it as much as possible because of the known sadness is brings to people. I've been taught to see illness and dying as being concerned and aware. I should be concerned for those who are ill and aware of the dying and deceased to be respectful. Being concerned and providing care seems to go hand and hand to be a good solution to aid people who are in need of help. That is another thing our culture has attended too. The association with help and caring for the ill and dying. We have this sense of giving back to those in dire need by providing them with "help" in what worries them most. As messed up as it sounds, another thought I had about illness and dying were the elderly people in our culture. We treat them with a different kind of respect because of this category of illness and dying they fall into. For example, my grandmother is in her 70's now, so I treat her completely different then how I would treat my younger sister who is 13. When my grandmother needs help with anything, I give her my immediate attention making sure she gets what she needs and because she is elderly I make it sort of my job to make sure she gets what she wanted. As for my sister, when she asks for anything, I give her the run around, or I just don't do it. And that's not because I don't love her, but because she is capable, and is not nearly as close to being elderly. What does this even mean then? Is it the fact that I am associating sick and dying with elderly people as a problem, or is it just appropriate to do so? To treat those who are going to meet their end, with ultimate kindness. Is there more than just associating help and kindness with illness and dying? Or is there more illness and dying could be implying?

I've also come to notice that after the passing of someone, there is a period of grief and then coming of moving on. Our culture tends to do this because we accept the lost we have encountered, and we try to make the best out of it. Basically saying, the gain in something we loose. I can't say from experience that I have lost someone dearly and gained a new benefit from it. But I can say something that is relevant to this; When I had lost my iPod there was a period of time that I missed listening to music on bus, later on I figured instead of just sitting on the bus now with no music, read or finish homework which the end result was getting better grades in school. I now own a Zune player. It's interesting now that I see it, I replaced what I had before after "that period of grief and then moving on" which is another thing our culture does. We replace what is missed, for instance a pet that has passed, many people will adopt a new one to cope with their feelings.