Dr. Ozzy

Over the weekend, The Sunday Times introduced Ozzy Osbourne as their new health advice columnist. Yes, you read that correctly…Ozzzy Osbourne…health advice. I admit, I let out a little chuckle on my Monday morning commute upon reading this, but I’ve been thinking about it (and read Ozzy’s first column) and I don’t see what’s so crazy about it.

Ozzy Osbourne

Ozzy is the first to admit that he has no medical training, very little formal education of any kind really, but he does have experience. The clichés about life making you wiser and experience giving you expertise (or whatever people say) aside, there is something to be said for what you learn from living life, and living through life. The amount of “stuff” Ozzy has lived through – both self-inflicted and by chance – is astonishing! His body has been abused, in every sense of the word, and yet he lives.

Personal narrative can have a huge impact on understanding illness. Whether that illness is an addiction, an injury caused by a freak accident, an STD, or a genetic disorder. Understanding the science behind why our body gets sick or injured, survives or parishes, is only half of the equation. How we as individuals experience, suffer, and survive is the other.

Our modern lives – while providing many of us with the opportunities to live longer and healthier lives than those before us – are harsh. We submit our bodies to a lot of “stuff”. And while I wouldn’t turn to Dr. Ozzy for ideas on preventing further AIDS transmissions or the best cancer treatments available (although he might have some interesting ideas!), I am looking forward to seeing what he has to say about being well, surviving, and living in these rockin’ times.

*Image originally from Ozzy’s first column.

Reluctant Reality

Many of us have aging parents and grandparents, facing any number of degenerative conditions, as well as family and friends facing the uncertain future that the diagnosis of chronic conditions, including cancers, can bring. Various factors in our society, here in the United States (and is other industrialized countries including the U.K. and Canada), have led to an increase in a variety of cancers, cardiovascular disease (CVD), diabetes, and others. These factors include longer life spans (we are living long enough to get ill in ways we might not have several generations ago), diet and lifestyle choices, and environmental (both “natural” and man-made) variants. With all that said, industrialized countries have growing segments of their populations living with, and inevitably dying from, these conditions. This has created an industry (for lack of a better word) of end-of-life care, including palliative care and hospice.

For those who may not know, palliative care is a method focused on alleviating pain, setting realistic goals, and realizing that for some individuals, quality of life is more important than further treatments. Now a standard option in the majority of U.S. hospitals, palliative care grew out of a backlash towards life and death becoming overly medicalized (some would argue it still is) and the idea that being present at the end of your life (with little physical pain) may be more important to some than being hooked-up to ventilators, feeding tubes, IV’s, etc. Palliative care does not necessarily mean individuals are giving-up or giving-in, it means that they, with the consultation and support of their physicians, have systematically, realistically, and reflectively addressed their health and their lives.

The NYTimes is running a series on the experience of terminal illness with a piece this past Sunday spotlighting a palliative care doctor fighting her own demise from cancer – her intellectual self at odds with her sick self. I have no idea how I would face such a challenge, how long and how hard I would fight. Facing death is a very personal and private struggle, yet one that is experienced by caregivers and loved ones too. Through my recent work on a caregiver narrative, reading Dr. Pardi’s story, and thinking about caregiving, the more I believe that the individual and community experience of facing illness is just as important as the innovations in medicine which strive to keep us living longer – helping us comprehend and face a reluctant reality.