Wellness #42: Staying Well

Up until I turned 40, staying well was a fairly simple process. Gradually, you start to notice that the ol' factory installed parts are not working as well as they used to. The first thing I noticed was that I don't heal as fast as I used to. Colds last longer, cuts take more time to mend, I tire easier. *groan* Getting old is a pain in the ass....which is another part of the body that hurts more too. Thanks to this assignment, however, now I can be at least better organized about my aches and pains. I went to Drugs.com and looked up my daily hypertension meds. Not much new but I did find out that Atenolol can make me short of breath. I thought that was just a symptom of age. I also visited the drug interaction checker and saw that some cold medicines can interfere with some Atenolol's efficacy. Didn't know that. Medline Plus is an in-depth resource for finding facilities in a particular area that provide specialized help for various conditions. I found that there are 187 facilities in my area that address hypertension-related illnesses. Good to know! Making a family medical history tree is a great idea. Unfortunately for me, I can only trace any medical history back two generations. Beyond that, my relatives were in China or Japan where I'm certain no medical records exist for that era and under less than modern conditions. For my son's sake, I wish a medical geneological study could be discovered but since his dad was adopted from Korea it seems we are both playing the same game of health roulette.