Proper care of an injured or ill friend

October 3, 2016October 4, 2016 / Laura Lee Carter / 11 Comments

I am now busy copying my favorite posts from my old blog called “Midlife Crisis Queen” as I have decided to close it down soon. I guess my midlife crisis is safely behind me now… I wrote this post a week or so after my bike accident in 2008, where I suffered a traumatic brain injury, fractured ribs, etc. Good advice to those of you who care for those with any bad injuries.

Having recently gone through the harrowing experience of a serious bike accident and its aftermath, I thought you might all benefit from some top do’s and don’ts when someone you love is injured or becomes seriously ill.

Do something. Say something. Don’t do or say nothing! BTW, an e-mail is nothing.
Do encourage your friend’s strength, spirit and efforts as they try to recover. Don’t minimize their efforts by saying trite things like: “A positive attitude is everything.”
Do help your friend communicate with others if they request it. In my case I was not able to communicate with my friends how disabled I was for a few weeks.
Do allow your friend to set the mood and limits around them. If they need to talk, go with that. Don’t impose your mood or fears upon them. Respect their limits in the amount of time they can handle spending with others.
Do bring cards, food, flowers, videos, etc. to cheer the person up, assist them, and make them feel loved and appreciated.
Do include your friend in events or activities they might be able to enjoy. It can get mighty lonely and discouraging spending days on end alone and aching.
Do acknowledge their physical changes or disabilities; don’t just ignore them or talk around them.
Do offer specific help. Don’t wait for the injured person to ask. If they have experienced a serious injury or concussion, it may not even occur to them to ask. Call them and visit when necessary to offer assistance.
Do ask sincerely and specifically about what they have gone through, and allow them to talk about their experience quietly. Listening may be your best skill at this point in time. Severe illness and injury is traumatic, and should be processed emotionally as needed. There are aspects of PTSD related to most serious accidents. Be open to helping your friend recover memories of the experience that they may have forgotten, process bad dreams surrounding their experience, etc.

It seems that many of us boomers may have lost the fine art of empathy and compassion necessary to care for friends who are ill or injured. This will not serve us, as we age and start to need to depend more heavily on our friends and loved ones for assistance.

Do we want to grow or not?

September 10, 2016April 23, 2020 / Laura Lee Carter / 7 Comments

After living here in rural southern Colorado for the past few years, I am often struck by my ambivalence towards attracting more people to this area. One thing is for sure, they are coming!

Each summer I see more people coming here to vacation and look for land or homes. The general trend is lots of Texans seeking a cooler place to summer, but I am now seeing more cars and RVs from other states, even as far away as New York.

And who can blame them? With sunrises like these, and towering peaks just a few miles off of Interstate 25, with rolling hills full of wildflowers, and cute little towns like La Veta, this place is some kind of paradise for nature lovers.

It’s not just me either. I checked with a local realtor this morning. She said the past few years have been “fabulous.” Our local water district reports that after five years with almost no requests for new water taps or hookups, they have received twelve requests in the past two months.

The 2008 recession hit this area very hard. Huerfano County still has one of the highest unemployment rates in our state, so it’s good to see things picking up and new businesses opening in Walsenburg and La Veta. My only fear is that too many people will move here and ruin our rural, relaxed atmosphere. Our saving grace seems to be how many choose to go elsewhere for winter.

I met a very interesting woman here a few months ago. She has lived in Aspen for the past forty years, and she cautioned us about telling too many people about this place. She hates to see what happened to Aspen, with a median home price of $1.5 million. I understand that kind of caution, because I first moved to Boulder in 1966. I saw so much change there over the decades, and most of it not good.

I cannot see Walsenburg turning into Aspen any time soon, but I would hate to lose the natural beauty and quiet that makes this such a great place to call home.

Did you ever wonder what it feels like to move to a very culturally different place to live a more natural way of life?

Here’s what that feels like….

Outdoor or Indoor Kitty?

September 6, 2016September 6, 2016 / Laura Lee Carter / 10 Comments

To give you some idea of the questions that we wonder about living here, away from all cities or even towns, recently we were discussing whether our cat should be let out to roam a bit, or is it too dangerous with the wild animals around here?

Charley the cat has been an indoor kitty since we got him last August. He was just a kitten then and had no idea where he was. Since then he has grown bored with our great indoors. He wants out!

Friends around here have both encouraged and warned us about letting animals out to roam. Especially dogs seem to disappear if you don’t keep close track of them.

Rasta never goes out without us close by. He was raised a city dog, and has no idea that other animals might come by to eat him. Einstein is his middle name, LOL!

But Charley is a whole different animal. He’s young and strong and a natural hunter. He loves exploring the sunflower groves outside our home, and he’s a great mouser. He needs to go out, it seems.

So this morning we let him out for a while. He loved it! I guess we’ll keep a close eye on him, and let him out a bit in the morning when most animals aren’t prowling for a meal. We’d hate to lose him.

Allowing your mind to lie fallow…

August 29, 2016August 12, 2020 / Laura Lee Carter / 8 Comments

Fallow: —adj, 1. (of land) left unseeded after being plowed and harrowed to regain fertility for a crop. 2. (of an idea, state of mind, etc) undeveloped or inactive, but potentially useful.

I got excited yesterday when I heard Meg Ryan, in her excellent interview on CBS Sunday Morning, mention the usefulness of doing nothing and allowing your mind to lie fallow for periods of time, with the purpose of generating more energy and fertility in your thought process.

I love this idea, and yet I find it to be an idea without strong acceptance in our hard-driving, demanding culture.

Because of my unfortunate recent experiences with TBI and concussion, I have had no choice but to take time to relax my brain so it can heal. But there is always a judgment from deep inside, one who feels lazy and unproductive at these times.

“Spacing out” is the best way I can think of to describe those times when my mind is simply exhausted and cannot focus on anything more. The good news? Meditation comes so easily to me now. It’s like my mind naturally relaxes and can think of nothing for a while. And even better, some of my best ideas later come from these times of allowing my mind to lie fallow, much like some who say that humanities best ideas have emerged from periods of relaxed thought.

When we daydream, we free our thinking of logical limits to allow knowledge, experiences, and ideas to essentially float freely in our mind and mingle with each other in a way that our logical mind cannot handle. Sometimes this undisciplined mingling creates that flash, that ‘aha’ moment. Aristotle had his eureka moment in a bathtub and Newton had his in an apple orchard. Where are yours?

Some call this mindfulness, others think we are really sleeping while awake. Either way, I have no choice at this point and I love the overall effects. Afterall:

Sleep is the BEST meditation. – Dalai Lama

I am filled with gratitude that I can now live like this forever. Please go learn more about our move from Fort Collins to here in my new memoir!

Getting used to something so right…

August 26, 2016March 15, 2021 / Laura Lee Carter / 7 Comments

I was singing along with that old Paul Simon song, “Can’t get used to something so right…” this morning, and realized sometimes I have that problem myself.

After over two years in the brand new world (for me) of rural southern Colorado, I would say I’m just beginning to settle in.

This adventure started back in mid-June of 2014, and I can assure you I wasn’t sure at all about this place. It all seemed so backward, slow and poor to me after living in Loveland and Fort Collins for years. People kept asking me why we moved here, and I wasn’t so sure myself. Luckily my husband is an “eyes-on-the prize” kind of man. He knew exactly why he was here!

My first year here was not good. Between feeling like a fish out of water myself, and the extremely challenging feat of building a custom solar home out in the foothills, my best description is STRESS CITY!

But once we moved out of Walsenburg and settled into our new home, life improved dramatically. After so much stress and our second move in a year, we spent weeks doing very little, simply enjoying our marvelous new environment…

OK, we spent most of our first winter here doing that!

One thing you need to know about this part of the country, things really do slow down here in the winter. I can remember days last winter when I went into La Veta, and it looked like a ghost town.

In the spring things liven up quite a bit. The tourists start coming down here and clogging up Main Street in Walsenburg. This past spring I started taking a yoga class and walking around La Veta in the mornings. I also started making a few friends and feeling more like I belong here.

Just yesterday I realized how right this place feels to me now. I love living in the country, I have a wonderful husband and home, I have new friends who care, and I rarely have to deal with all the things I hated in the city.

Life is good and getting better. Mission accomplished!

Want to learn more about the experience of moving from the city to the country to live a quiet, relaxed life? Check it out here!

Boomers and Their Busy Boomer Lives!

August 14, 2016October 23, 2016 / Laura Lee Carter / 6 Comments

When I woke up this morning it was chilly and rainy outside. Then I looked out east and boom! what an amazing sunrise!

But even the nicest places on earth can be ruined if you aren’t getting along with your significant other. That’s why it’s so important to manage your ‘closeness’ so you can both be happy in retirement!

Writer Meryl Baer says, there are all sorts of reasons people love the place they live. She enjoys her current hometown because of the ease of walking and cycling around town. In this week’s post, she lists the Ten reasons I love my walkable community.

Writer Carol Cassara says, many boomers who are otherwise living fulfilled lives, face problems with waning libidos. She explains over at Heart-Mind-Soul, there’s no need to deny ourselves the pleasure of a vibrant sex life, not when there’s a new book by boomer and midlife sex expert Walker Thornton that offers practical advice to anyone who would like to invite desire back into their life. Carol reviews Ms. Thornton’s book here. And to give love equal time, she offers her simple secret to love!

According to Tom Sightings, in Beaten by the Bureaucracy, sometimes it’s hard to appreciate what the government does for us, even if you’re a liberal. He tells the story of changing his driver’s license and car registration after he moved to a new state. What’s the solution? “Don’t move to a new state!”

Over at The Survive and Thrive Boomer Guide, Rita R. Robison, a consumer journalist, gives us a report on her bountiful garden. Robison, who went on vacation for a week, found that special something that gardeners dread finding when they return: “Surprises From My Garden.”

Just published my memoir of moving to this beautiful rural place in southern Colorado to get a ways off the grid and finally truly enjoy life! Please take a look!