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Journal nizo's Journal: Reality check: Pull my plug 14

Journal by nizo

A recent journal entry about the lady who woke up from a 20 year coma got me to thinking: What would happen if I was in a coma for 20 years? Let me tell you, the answers freak me out. Here is what I came up with after thinking about it for 10 minutes.

I would be 54 years old. Too young to retire, and to old to get any kind of decent job; I mean hell I work in the tech field and I would be way out of date.
My kids would be 21 and 28 respectively. I would have missed out watching them grow up; hell they would probably have kids by then. My mom would be in her late 80s, assuming she was still alive, and of course the rest of my family would be 20 years older. I doubt my fiance' would be in the picture either, and frankly I wouldn't blame her. If I am a veggie and I couldn't move for 20 years, feel free to pull my plug and let me start over, not to mention let everyone get on with their lives. The twenty year gap in my life is too horrible to imagine.

All that said, there is nothing like a little reminder to be thankful for what I have, and to treasure the time I have, especially with my kids, because before I know it, it will be 20 years from now.

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Reality check: Pull my plug More

Reality check: Pull my plug

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  • Think of how different your local, and not so local communities would be by then too. 20 years ago, we had a jellybean, former chimp loving actor for President. Could we be singing Hail to the Chief to Mandy Moore by then?

    Could it be concievable that you wouldn't know how to replenish a vehicle with the current fuel? How about clothing? Food?

    No, I don't think things would be drastically different in 20 years, but somethings might be different enough to be a bit disturbing. Add that on to the dramat
    • So what's the cut off? 'Cause, if you were in a coma for 3 months, it would be bad. Hell, my Short Term Disability would still be in effect. I'd be making money in the coma. So how long do they wait before pulling your respective plugs?
      • Yeah I was thinking about that, I think the longest I would want to be in a coma would be a few years (5 max). Basically long enough for me to give me a good chance to come out of it, but not so long that I start to just be a drain on family members (plus there is the whole closure thing). Which of course reminds me; I need to create a living will so I can have this taken care of.

        Speaking of timeframes, apparently this lady thought she was about 22 when she woke up, so time certainly passed differently for

    • On the other hand, think of how much awe and wonder one could be in after 20 years of being in the dark. Things we take for granted, like looking up directions online, would be near miracles to somebody 20 years ago. I still know how to read a map, but to have a course automatically plotted is really cool.

      Things like plasma TVs. How'd they get so small over 20 years time? CG movies, 20 years ago was Max Headroom even on, or was that later in the 80s? Cell phones everywhere. Cars are less blocky, though gas

      • But would you know how to use the three shells?
        • Korn, C, and Bash? I do now (to varying degrees), I didn't 20 years ago. Of course, I was sitting on my fathers lap watching him work "magic" on the computer 20 years ago and musing how 8" floppies would make good playthings. Not that I had access to Unix or Linux machines until much later than that. I think I touched VMS before Unix.

          Or did I just completely miss the question?

  • if you're in a coma that long, even if there are PTs to come therapise your body often, you're going to have all sorts of physical disability issues.

    I wouldn't want someone to pull the plug on me unless I was going to have serious issues like that, or be a vegetable, but... What if the people I love are dead when I wake up? I'm a loner in practice, but with the tacit understanding that I do have relatives, etc., that I can rely on if needed.
  • I would be 54 years old. Too young to retire, and to old to get any kind of decent job; I mean hell I work in the tech field and I would be way out of date.

    You'd fit right in at a bank.;)
  • Do people in a coma age 'normally'? Or does their ageing become suspended too?
    • Oh you age, probably in some ways faster than normal, since people's bodies aren't meant to lie flat for extended periods of time. The physical therapy alone afterwards would be horrible :-( Now I know why she wanted makeup first thing; she looked worse than she could have imagined because she was quite a bit older....
  • I'd be 56 and my kids would be 36, 34 and 33. I cannot imagine the grief, stress and financial expense they would have been put through over that 20-year period. I'd rather set a cut-off date of no more than a year or two, unless there is a strong prognosis for nearly full recovery. Otherwise, I'd say "cut me free". I'm not that attached to this body.
  • drunk who hit her only got 6 months in prison. If I was the judge that sentenced him, I would put him in jail for, ohh, I don't know, 20 years?

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Thus mathematics may be defined as the subject in which we never know what we are talking about, nor whether what we are saying is true. -- Bertrand Russell

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