Sick and depressed about it: COPD

by Jennifer Donovan
(Houghton, MI, USA)

Horrible week. I thought adjusting to retirement was tough. Now I've been diagnosed with COPD and am on oxygen.

I feel like my life has just shrunk to a hopeless little nub.

Working on finding a more positive attitude. It's not easy.

Comments for Sick and depressed about it: COPD

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COPD Blues
by: Craig/Minneapolis

I am not going to make lemonade out the COPD lemon, but I too was recently diagnosed with COPD and have had to deal with it as best I can.

"Fortunately", I also have a brain tumor that mitigates any distress that I might have regarding the COPD. Give me the COPD any day.

There are effective therapies for that disease, including oxygen, which, together with life style adjustments, allow a person to lead a reasonably active life.

Depression is the grim thief of one's ability to derive pleasure from their day to day existence. I still believe that there is hope after diagnosis and I can't allow depression to rob me of hope. There is still a lot to see, learn and do and retirement is the perfect time to indulge in those pursuits.

You are here today. Yesterday is history. Tomorrow's a mystery. (per that noted philosopher, Justin Timberlake).

Alas, it is way too easy to give in to depression and rather daunting to fight for your right to happiness. It is a good fight and gives you many reasons for prudent optimism.

Might I recommend that you work on your depression, in concert with your physicians, because with depression under control you will be in a better position to contend with your COPD issues.

Your attitude will be more upbeat and that will really help you out. Good luck to you.
Do what you can
by: Roger WestVirginia

COPD is not the end of the world. I have it and I not on oxygen, I still get out shop for myself.

I walk a half mile every day. I go out to the movies once a week.

Now I moved a lot slower, and if I walk a lot, I have to stop and take a rest -- but hey, I'm not 21 any more.
Crawling out of the retirement dumps.
by: Jane/Texas

We all go through periods of "poor me" once we retire and have to face the fact that things have changed. COPD is not the end. I was diagnosed with it years and years ago. With work you can get to the point where the tiny portable oxygen machines will do the trick and you can keep on trucking. Eventually, with exercise and not hurrying so much you might even get to the point where you can disconnect once in a while and just relax without it. It take practice and a desire to get off your fanny and do it.

No one can do it for you. It does help if you put on your little machine and a smile and do some volunteer work. When you help someone else you breath easier. You think I am just pulling your leg. I died of a pulmonary embolism on March 11, 2016. I had been on oxygen for two years and did not do anything but go from one pity party to the next. Volunteering brought me out of it.

My mother and her older sister both went through depression when they first retired. Read a post, Isabell's Wedding Day and you will see how they came out of it. It is a choice first, then just a matter of doing it. You are either happy where you are or you are taking steps to change it. One or the other. If it is to be..it is up to me. Wise words from my grandmother. Good luck. Hope we hear something wonderful you have done or about your next adventure. It is not luck.. it is a matter of choice.

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