Has your doctor referred you to physical therapy to improve your
strength? Even kids, let alone adults, and especially seniors, lose
strength very rapidly when immobile. Fortunately, guess whose strength
improves most rapidly with proper strength-building exercise: the
oldest, weakest people, right into their 90s. Your lungs will constrain
your pace, but immobility is far more devastating to muscle power than
is being on oxygen. A physical therapist accustomed to working on the
elderly -- as many PT patients are -- should be able to accommodate your
restrictions, beginning right there in a hospital bed. If you can
shuffle down the hall to the foot of a flight of stairs, you are ready
to start PT aimed at increasing your strength and mobility.

I.P.

I.P. is right on about the loss of strength when immobile.  It can
happen after only a few days of lying in bed.  After a couple of
weeks, older patients have to literally learn to walk again.  In
addition, if you are thin, any illness can sap your appetite causing
you to lose a few pounds.  If there's little to no fat to lose, your
body uses muscle mass to keep going.  Those muscles are lost forever
unless there is exercise and/or physical therapy.  Even simple things
such as raising and lowering your legs while sitting can restore
sufficient strength to get up and down stairs.  No matter, a little
physical therapy can do wonders.
Dave Perry

I'm really sorry to hear that, Jim.  If only the thought of a possibility,
it was still better than feeling bad and waiting for the end.

I'm so sorry.

I'm so sorry, Jim. You've gone through so much.
I'll be here watching for your posts and hoping you'll improve.
J

Sorry to hear about the setback Jim.

Has anyone suggested the second line hormone therapies - DES,
estradiol, ketoconazole?  I wouldn't be very optimistic about them,
but maybe they're worth trying.  Perhaps your doctors have already
tried them, or considered them and decided they aren't right for you.

As others have said, do try some physical therapy.  My father-in-law
died recently at age 87.  In the last year of his life he was disabled
by pneumonia, stroke, diabetes, and renal failure.  He was in pretty
bad shape, but he exercised every day that year and I'm sure it
helped keep him mobile and keep his spirits up, even when he was
finally reduced to a wheelchair for his last few months.

I suspect that you are a man who is well loved by his family, and who
has provided well for them.  If you don't make it to Germany, at
least you'll have the compensation of being near them and
enjoying their company.

I know life has become very tough, but I hope there are still some
good times, good days, good companionship, and pleasant
memories for you.

Best wishes.

   Alan

Dear Jim,

I'm really sorry about that.  I know how much you were looking forward
to going to this clinic.  And you can't follow my advice:-)

Like people said, you could probably benefit from PT, but it sounds
like you need to have a caretaker around so that you don't have to
travel on your butt.

I was just re-reading a letter we had rec'd from a friend in Denmark,
who had had a stroke 3 yrs. ago at age 53.  Incidentally, he did not
have any risk factors that I know of.  He is doing much better now
(but still pretty disabled), but he has had to really work on it.  The
reason I was rereading his letter is because it was a nice reflection
on what's really important in life (cooking).  Anyway, I thought the
part about what he has had to give up and what he can still do was
cute.

"I have come to accept that there are many things I can't do any more
(like biking, running, travel far) -- but they are not so important to
me anymore.  Thank God I have kept my honeysweet but lethal tongue.  I
can still kill people with words -- and in a very polite and elegant
ways that is).  And I have kept my absurd and 'crazy' humor."

Wish you the very best.

Leah