THE Prepping thread - a new beginning :)

GreyQueen

I am a healthy person with living with two chronic illnesses, one of which requires constant medication to keep me alive.

I have taken precisely 5 days (consecutive, for a planned surgery) for sick leave in the past 13 years. If you saw me IRL, you'd notice the relaxed demeanour, the laconic temperament, the healthy glowing skin, the good lifestyle habits. My blood pressure is always low and my pulse ticks over at levels normally seen in elite athletes * - a resting pulse of 48 bpm.

I've even had a GP complain I didn't go to see them enough, fgs, as if I was somehow guilty of neglecting them. Can't recall when I last had a cold, gotta be at least a couple of years. Hell, a lot of people are decidedly cross to discover that I am at least a decade older than I appear to be.

I come from long-lived people on both sides of the family, my ancestors making their early eighties, minimum, as a matter of record for at least the past 350 years. Since I've never smoked and rarely drink, and don't do stupid things with recreational drugs or keep bad company, I should make old bones.

I have every intention of being around for many years and being a right PITA for as long as it amuses me.

* and sloths.;)

moneyistooshorttomention

westcoastscot wrote: »

MTSTM - you are correct, single women with no children will have a different life expectancy than Mums - I understand loneliness in later life has a massive impact on health and well-being, and there is no doubt that both years of manual work and years of office work will both bring with them differing health challenges.

I am a bit confused by this?? I'm not sure why loneliness is being mentioned - as that's something unrelated to whether people have or have not had children???

I was referring to all women without children - and we know that a lot of single women have children too these days.

I'm not sure whether you're saying things are the other way round to what I would expect? I've read of a lot of women getting health problems from having children. I've not read of any women having health problems from not having children. The body is put under quite a strain having pregnancies, further strain in giving birth and more strain again from sleepless nights from babies waking frequently - so I would expect women who've gone through that to steadily be at higher and higher risk with each stage of that process of getting permanent health problems. The more children then the higher the risk of permanent health problems.

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On a different topic - it would be interesting to know what the health record of people generally of some other countries is (I'm thinking of Germany, Holland and the Scandinavian countries - ie similar lifestyles to our own, but where I would expect people to be healthier than here - courtesy of better healthcare than Britain has and their slightly different way of life/eating to ours). Distinct envy/feeling the Germans have got things right recently when I saw that the Germans can get 3 weeks for free in a spa if they need it...

In reverse - I would expect Americans to be unhealthier than British - courtesy of their diet and only 0-2 weeks paid holiday per year.

greenbee

MTSM - there are a lot of health problems caused by not having children. Biologically women are designed to be pregnant/lactating from puberty, and the hormonal impact of this not happening is significant. These problems are relatively new as prior to the advent of reliable contraception the majority of women were either pregnant or dead in the years between puberty and menopause. I'm willing to bet that single/infertile women didn't live to a great old age before the advent of modern obstetrics improved the lot of mothers - even if they weren't at risk of dying in childbirth they were more likely to die of hormonal cancers.

greenbee

Oh - and the US holiday thing is not universal. My US colleagues get 35 days 'paid time off'. If they don't take any sick leave that's all holiday... However, they don't get sick leave separately like we do until ther insurance kicks in with short term disability, so time off for minor ailments has to come out of their annual leave.

moneyistooshorttomention

greenbee wrote: »

MTSM - there are a lot of health problems caused by not having children. Biologically women are designed to be pregnant/lactating from puberty, and the hormonal impact of this not happening is significant. These problems are relatively new as prior to the advent of reliable contraception the majority of women were either pregnant or dead in the years between puberty and menopause. I'm willing to bet that single/infertile women didn't live to a great old age before the advent of modern obstetrics improved the lot of mothers - even if they weren't at risk of dying in childbirth they were more likely to die of hormonal cancers.

It would be interesting to see any comparative research on that - ie of women who've had children v. women who haven't

There's always been a group of women that haven't I guess throughout history - ie nuns. Now that would be interesting - to see if there have been any health studies done on groups of nuns at any point. That combination of childless (bar any family women that have "joined up" in later life obviously), plain diet, etc.

EDIT; Just started googling re health of nuns and the very first item google came up with was an article "why do nuns outlive the rest of us"..off for a read...

GreyQueen

There are slightly-elevated risks of some cancers for the childless woman as opposed to the child-bearing woman. This is something known to science. Doesn't follow that each and every childless woman is personally running those risks, or that mothers get free pass. Biology is a lot more complicated than that.

There are also risk factors to the childbearing woman, dependant on such factors as did she breast-feed and, if so, for how long. And whether or not you breastfeed isn't often a choice, it may not be possible.

My own mother had full-on psychosis after my younger brother's birth, we're talking 8 weeks in an institution here. She has also required a hysterectomy as a result of childbirth complications.

There are risks and benefits to most potential human activities, only some activities are utterly bad or completely benign.

The longest-lived and healthiest women are apparently life-long celibates - nuns.

greenbee

There is currently discussion among some in the medical profession that as obstetrics and midwifery continue to improve (and recognition and treatment of things like PND), and therefore the risks involved with childbirth reduce, they will continue to see an increase in what they term '21st century' diseases - ones that haven't previously been seen because lifestyle factors (such as the inevitability amongst pretty much all except nuns of pregnancy and the accompanying risks) - and these may start to become more visible as pregnancy-related risks reduce while these disease increase. (I got to hear a LOT about this when they were trying to diagnose me and then come up with some kind of treatment).

I guess it's much like the increases we've seen first in cancers and then in dementia as life expectancy has increased as other risks that resulted in shorter lifespans have been reduced. As we fix one thing, something else will take it's place. We can't all live for ever...

GreyQueen

Indeed.

As they said in Fight Club, and the slogan of the 'Hedge; on a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero.

[Deleted User]

greenbee wrote: »

We can't all live for ever...

I'm going to have a damn good try.

[Deleted User]

GreyQueen wrote: »

As they said in Fight Club, and the slogan of the 'Hedge; on a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero.

A saying I heard years ago, which stuck in my mind, is:-

We were all sentenced to death, 9 months before we were born.