One of the major reasons people commit suicide is because of poor health. As I explained in “Why” and “Why Not?” to the left of this page, health has nothing to do with it for me. I’ve always thought I had pretty good health. After all, I never drank or smoked and I was within reasonable weight limits for my size. You may have no interest in this, but here is a summary.

I mention this elsewhere, but I didn’t miss a scheduled day of work in over 30 years leading up to my death. I don’t even know what it means to be too sick to work. I’m thankful to God for having such good fortune and I sympathize with those who don’t.

I can only begin to imagine the suffering that some people go through before ultimately deciding to end their life. There are probably millions of elderly people who would choose to end their life if they had the option. Of course, they don’t. The family doesn’t have an option either unless the person is brain dead. Being brain dead (something I can almost identify with) isn’t so bad because you don’t know the difference. But, it’s also no reason to live. Anything less than that means experiencing the suffering – and for what?

No parent should ever see a child die, so if a child is struggling, they try to stay alive as long as they can. Besides, they might live long enough to beat the problem. The reward is a long healthy life and maybe becoming the next President of the United States. Who knows? That all makes sense.

But, when someone has lived their life and the only thing left is suffering, it’s time to go! Obviously, I say it’s time to go because I say it for myself and I haven’t suffered at all.

There are only four times I’ve been sick in the last 30+ years and three of them were due to my own stupidity - two of which I talk about elsewhere on this site. The fourth was having an appendicitis attack.

One morning in 2002, started feeling pain and sickness around 6AM. By 9AM, I had to go to the emergency walk-in clinic nearby. They diagnosed me with an appendicitis attack and referred me to a local hospital. I was scheduled for 1PM, so I went home and worked on the computer for a couple hours even though it was miserable.

I went to the hospital. In no time they had me under the knife. I had laparoscopic surgery – which means they only make a small incision near the naval and go in from there. Actually, I think they made two or three small incisions, but they only required a couple stitches.

I stayed overnight in the hospital Monday, but went home Tuesday at noon. And, this is a fact… I was singing in choir practice on Wednesday night. So, the point of this is that it’s the worst physical problem I ever had and it was no big deal at all.

I also mentioned this event under Living Donor to the left.

I bring up the other three times I got sick because you might find it interesting how anyone could be so stupid!

1. The first was on my honeymoon in 1981 with Chris. I have a section to the left called “Honeymoon…s” where I tell the story in detail. The short version is that I popped a bunch of Vivarin (200mg caffeine) to stay awake driving to Florida on an empty stomach on my honeymoon night when I should have known better. They made me sick enough that I had to go to the emergency room of a hospital in Tennessee. I was stupid.

2. The second time was also when I was on vacation - this time in Galveston in 1990. I discuss this episode in a section to the left called “Trips and Travel”. The short version of this is that I and my wife Chris decided to take a fishing trip out into the Gulf of Mexico. But, I opted for the eight-hour version instead of the four-hour and I picked a day when the wind made the seas rough and I didn’t prepare by taking Dramamine or anything else. I was sicker than a dog during the entire voyage. I was stupid.

3. The third time was in 2001. I had given blood at the church and while I was there I stupidly let them give me a shot to prevent the flu - stupid, especially since I never got the flu! Supposedly, these flu shots are incapable of creating the flu, but I beg to differ. Early in the afternoon, I went out dirt bike (bicycle) riding where I completely exhausted myself. Yep, I got sick for the next 24 hours. Even if the flu shot wasn’t responsible – which I maintain it was – I should never have exerted myself like that after giving blood. I was stupid.

Those are the only four times I’ve been sick in my adult life. The appendicitis attack was relatively small potatoes and the three other times I got sick because of my own stupidity totaled no more than the equivalent of a couple days.

I don’t have broken bones or muscle problems or ligament problems or allegies or anything else. I only take acid indigestion pills to keep that under control. The pills do the job. Of course, as I have gotten older, I can’t do what I used to. In fact, over the last couple years, I’ve noticed my ability to run or bike or move furniture to be considerably more difficult in terms of endurance. But, I don’t exercise all that much, so I was probably lucky to get as many good years out of my body as I got.

I’ve never eaten properly. My personality is so obsessive that once I started working on something, I couldn’t stand to put it down until I was done. This web-site is a challenge in that respect because it’s taken many weeks and I have had to start and stop dozens, if not hundreds, of times.

When I was working in the 1980’s I started skipping lunch because it meant taking a break and I didn’t want no stinking breaks. I never ate breakfast so it turned into a lifestyle whereby I would eat once a day – supper.

As years and years went by, that became so normal that I never even thought about food before supper. I would eat enough at supper that I wasn’t ever hungry any other time. In fact, eventually, I forgot what the feeling of hunger even was. Trust me, when I was a kid I knew. The best meal we would have growing up was macaroni with a can of tomato soup spread over it. YUK!

Still, as I got older, I gained weight. I eventually got up to 190 pounds when ideal weight probably should have been 160. Within months of my suicide I lost 27 pounds and dropped back to a low of 163 in order to donate a kidney. I didn’t want them rejecting me because of weight. The way I did it was to simply not eat every third day or so and to give up anything fattening. It only took about four weeks to lose the first 21 pounds. It was unbelievably easy. At one point just before I bottomed out at 163, I only ate seven days out of 17 - one meal each time. As hard as it will be for anyone to believe, I never felt hungry even after four straight non-eating days. I only ate on the fifth day because I was feeling weak and decided I probably better get some energy.

I’ve always been pretty disciplined with respect to eating. For Lent I would give up Ice Cream, Chocolate and Pizza. That wasn’t that hard except for Pizza. I’ve always said…

Four P’s to a healthier you – Pizza, Pepsi, Poop and Pee.

So, losing 27 pounds wasn’t too tough. The other reason I did it was that I wanted to make sure my blood results were acceptable when donating an organ. Again, I didn’t want to be rejected as a donor just because I hadn’t been eating right.

Still, I ate what I wanted and I only ate one meal a day - and even then, not every day. I’m proof (physically) that you can do that and survive just fine… unless, of course, you choose not to survive at the age of 60.

My latest blood results (2012) were all within the acceptable parameters.

I’m fairly confident these numbers would be even better if I were to have gotten blood results in 2013. But, I knew it didn’t matter since I wasn’t going to live much longer and since I only cared about being healthy enough to donate an organ.