As our ship neared the Arctic Circle last year on our 46-day cruise, I had an episode of GI bleeding later attributed to strong coffee mixed with strong painkillers and high-acid food.. The ship’s doctor was not happy and explained in gruesome detail how bleeding to death on a cruise ship would not be fun and he wouldn’t allow it on his watch. He ordered us off the ship in St. Johns, Newfoundland unless we could be certified by a gastroenterologist as being “fit to travel”. It was a Sunday afternoon; the ship departed at 5pm. Amazingly, a gastroenterologist was found who abandoned his golf game, gathered his crew, did an endoscopy, found nothing and scrawled on a piece of his letterhead “Fit to Travel.”
Last month, we had yet another travel emergency, just three months out from a planned second cruise. On the second day of a family visit, a painful sore throat and productive cough ended a planned four-day visit after two days. By the end of the agonizingly long 6 hour train ride, I was feverish and breathless. Our community’s medical team sent me straight to the hospital. Diagnosis: Pneumonia, respiratory failure and pulmonary edema. I was acutely ill. The pneumonia’s gone, only a bit of fatigue remains but fear of sudden acute illness spilled over into our travel plans. Does yet another cruise increase the risk of being disembarked someplace where quality medical care is unavailable? We began to think of cancelling the trip.
If we cancel the trip, our travel insurance policy will only reimburse us if the illness is so disabling in the written opinion of a Physician as to prevent you from taking your Trip…” I am still recovering, but certainly not disabled. My physicians see no reasons to cancel. Fear of illness is not a reimbursable excuse for cancelling though we have plenty of trepidation.
We elders wish to live every moment, and yet we also wish to avoid risk to life and limb. Within that dichotomy are nearly constant decisions ranging from eating a bowl of ice cream to knee replacement surgery. Sometimes we can adapt, as with non-dairy ice cream. Other times it’s a matter of probing our fears, recognizing that they may be less about illness or death, and more about powerlessness and lack of control.
Ultimately we decided to take this cruise, predicting that we will probably not cruise outside the US again. We will take care with diet, sun, experiences—the gondola ride over the jungle beckons, but the zip line tour will not happen. We will keep emergency supplies and phone numbers handy while studiously attempting to let go of irrational fears of illness and death. Living life while letting go of (some of) our belief that we can control it.
Uncharted Waters 